Since the previous podcast in September, we have seen ISIS rise up from relative obscurity to a headline phenomenon requiring the attention of leaders around the world. In this podcast we provide you with a summary of a few headline cases here in Australia to fill you in. We continue with the reading of the Tyranny of God. In Chapter 20, we look at a World Without God.

Hello, this is Marquez from Reasonism.Org and welcome to Reasonism Radio. Reasonism Radio is a podcast for free-thinkers, non-believers, Reasonists, atheists and religious believers alike. You can listen to our podcasts by subscribing on iTunes or your favourite podcast software or by visiting our website at Reasonism.Org.

Since the previous podcast in September, we have seen ISIS rise up from relative obscurity to a headline phenomenon requiring the attention of leaders around the world.

Judging from the server logs and website stats, many listeners of this podcast are from around the world. Half of you are from the USA. The rest come from India, Brazil, Canada, the UK, Philippines, New Zealand and Germany. I would like to give a summary of events here in Australia to fill you in.

I am aware of at a few cases where Australian Jihadists went overseas to fight for ISIS. The first was Mohammad Ali Baryalei (Source), a former bouncer and part-time actor. There was also and an Australian teenager who went to Baghdad and bombed a busy market place, killing at least five people. They're not alone. It seems that there are many Jihadists are going overseas to fight for ISIS.

I find this all so ironic. Migrants from other countries come to Australia, Australia – its government and its people -- accepts them… grants them Residency and Citizenship rights, and yet they, or their children, go overseas to fight against the Australian Government, against the Australian people. The same can be said for the situation in the UK and the US.

In September 23, shortly after a video of speech made by ISIS encouraged Muslims to kill infidels, shed their blood and take their money, there was the case of an 18 year old 'radicalised' boy who pulled a knife and stabbed a police officer who later shot the boy (Source).

There was also Rasoul Al Mousawi who was shot dead outside a Shia Muslim Prayer Hall by a man believed to be from a Sunni extremist group in Sydney who wants to establish an Islamic caliphate in the Middle East (Source).

As a result of what some Australians see and read on the news, they decided it was a good idea to call, Muslim Australians they see in shopping centres as 'terrorists' and tell them to 'go back to their own country'. (Source)

This is a mistake. The best allies we have against Extremist Muslims are moderate or non-practicing Muslims. It is they who have the influence and the power to have conversations with young men who are being indoctrinated and radicalised by extremist groups. Many Muslims want the same thing we want. They want peace. They want their children to group and contribute to society.

Therefore, instead of alienating them, we need to create stronger bonds with Muslims who also want peace.

Knowing that this is happening in your community, in your country, often times makes you feel helpless. And just recently, I thought, "why even bother"? Why even continue with these podcasts? Why even continue with this blog?

But we cannot give up. Even if these podcasts or blog posts eventually only reaches one person out there but if that person stops and questions their beliefs at some stage, then it is resistance: Resistance to the insanity that is affecting too many lives.

So let's press on. In the previous podcasts, we went through the 19th chapter of my book the Tyranny of God where I argued that we can believe in anything we want but, we have an obligation to justify our beliefs to other people because it affects their lives and well-being.

In our discussion of ISIS, a big part of their training process is to inculcate their recruits with their religious ideology (Source). These religious ideologies are possible only because they have been allowed to persist for so long, privileged, remaining relatively unchallenged by the rest of society.

Consider for example that ISIS has a poem it hands out to its recruits. This poem promises their recruits that if they fight for ISIS, they will spend the rest of eternity with 72 virgins having round and firm chests (Source). Look I am in no way suggesting that the motivation of most ISIS fighters is for this promise but I am just citing it as an example of a religious idea that we, as a society, because most of us are too afraid to offend religious sensitivities, we have insufficiently challenged the truthfulness of claims like these over generations and have allowed it to persist. Now, 2014, we have to be in a war against an army of young men inculcated with religious ideas such as this.

People do have an obligation to justify and argue for their religious convictions with the rest of us because religious beliefs can lead to disastrous consequences now or in the future.

In this and future podcasts, we explore and envision what the world without religion and superstition… without beliefs in a god or gods.

This Sunday, 7th of December 2014, Chapter 20 of the Tyranny of God, A World Without God.

In the previous podcast, I concluded that religious beliefs exist only to benefit their own progeny, not ours. In their struggle to assert themselves and dominate our minds, the memes inside our heads are commandeering us to wage war against each other and we simply become collateral damage. The sad thing is, even if many people kill and die for these beliefs, they are not alive. Yet many of us choose to act upon them and so manifest themselves in our world.

In this podcast I argue against the idea that everyone should believe in whatever they want to believe to the extent that we should not even question whether these beliefs are true, valid or supported by evidence.

This Sunday, 7th of September 2014, Chapter 19 of the Tyranny of God, Why We Need to Justify Our Beliefs.

In the previous podcast, we looked at how the foundations of our way of life, specifically, democracy and our freedom to think and to express our thoughts and our ideas continue to be undermined by religion.

In this podcast I will discuss the Fallacy of Religious Moderation to explore the ideas of religion being more modern, being more moderate and being more tolerant as though it has now evolved to a much wiser form of its violent and intolerant past. We will be prompted to ask what it is that we truly believe in and to think about what it means to believe.

This Sunday, 6th of July 2014, Chapter 18 of the Tyranny of God, The Fallacy of Religious Moderation.

religious moderation

fallacy of religious moderation

]]>PodcastsSat, 05 Jul 2014 22:20:52 +1000Access Ministries Calls for a Petition Drivehttp://reasonism.org/main-content/item/2745-access-ministries-calls-for-a-petition-drive
http://reasonism.org/main-content/item/2745-access-ministries-calls-for-a-petition-driveAccess Ministries, Public schools should not be used as a place where Christians can indoctrinate children. Do it in your Private Schools but do not expect Tax Payers to fund you spreading your nonsense to their children in 'their' schools!﻿

In the previous podcast, we looked at the basic premise of democracy and the crucial concept of separating religion from the state. This Separation of Church from State is under threat in two fronts: Christian Dominionism and Shariah Law. Building on that in this podcast, I will discuss how Religions are undermining our Freedom of Speech, Freedom of Expression and Freedom of Thought. This Sunday, 11th of May 2014, The Final Part of Chapter 17 of the Tyranny of God, God's Threat to Democracy.

Today, we live in a world that has accepted and embraced many concepts that were once considered heretical, blasphemous or just generally irreligious. Yet, in most measures, our lives are generally much better off than they have ever been if we compare them with the lives of our ancestors living in the medieval ages and in more ancient times. In this podcast, I will argue that Religion continues to threaten the basic foundation of our modern societies: democracy.

In the previous podcast, I went through how human civilisation struggled out of religious despotism from the 1600s onwards. I said that our thinking has been transformed in different stages from the Protestant Revolution, The Age of Reason and The Age of Enlightenment all the way to the influences of scientific knowledge and discoveries and the development of new thoughts and ideas in politics, economics and philosophy. Now, we live in a world that has accepted and embraced many concepts that were once considered heretical, blasphemous or just generally irreligious. Yet, in most measures, our lives are generally much better off than they have ever been if we compare them with the lives of our ancestors living in the medieval ages and in more ancient times.

In this podcast, I will argue that Religion continues to threaten the basic foundation of our modern societies: democracy.

This Sunday, 6th of April 2014, Chapter 17 of the Tyranny of God, God's Threat to Democracy.

In this podcast, I will pick up from where we left off and discuss how the role and our perception of money and wealth evolved from just something to give to the church, to something that people used as an indicator of their soul's fate, and now, as something on which we have built our capitalist societies. From there, I will discuss the rise of irreligious and secular ideas. I will list what they were and how we have changed the way we perceive ourselves and how we approach our lives.

This Sunday, 16th of March 2014, Part 2 of Chapter 16 of the Tyranny of God, Escape from Religious Despotism.

In the previous podcast, we broadcasted the first part of Chapter 16 of the Tyranny of God titled Escape from Religious Despotism. I went through certain aspects of our lives today and compared them with what it was like when religion was at the height of its power centuries ago, before the wave of changes brought about by the Protestant Revolution, the Age of Reason and the Age of Enlightenment.

I discussed how homes, and not just the church, have become places of worship, and sex became something that can and should be, enjoyed by both men and women, and not something dirty, to be ashamed of. We talked about Divorce, how people no longer have to stay in relationships if they are being abused, cheated on, or for whatever reason. People have become more literate and are encouraged to read books and educate themselves. We talked about gays and lesbians who struggle to have their relationships validated and acknowledged, just like heterosexual relationships. The last topic we discussed was how art stopped being an instrument of religion. Artists began featuring everyday people, not just saints and angels, in their artworks , and began expressing their thoughts and ideas about the human experience.

In this podcast, I will pick up from where we left off and discuss how the role and our perception of money and wealth evolved from just something to give to the church, to something that people used as an indicator of their soul's fate, and now, as something on which we have built our capitalist societies. From there, I will discuss the rise of irreligious and secular ideas. I will list what they were and how we have changed the way we perceive ourselves and how we approach our lives.

This Sunday, 16th of March 2014, Part 2 of Chapter 16 of the Tyranny of God, Escape from Religious Despotism.

In the previous podcast, we broadcasted the final part of Chapter 15 of the Tyranny of God where I hope to have shown how the two dominant religions, Christianity and Islam came to dominate our civilisation not by mysterious divine powers but by being methodical in ways that evolved over time as religious leaders learnt from what worked and what didn’t. For thousands of years, humanity has followed similar patterns of inventing religions, growing their number of followers through brute force and violence as evidenced by our history of wars and battles due to religious competition. Although we still have many people holding to divisive ideas and belief systems today, it is still remarkable and worthy of celebrations that we have managed to somehow break free from a world totally led and controlled by religious zealots.

In the next Chapter, we will come to understand the inspiring story of how we have accomplished this feat. This Sunday, 23rd of February 2014, Chapter 16 of the Tyranny of God, Escape from Religious Despotism.

In the previous podcast, we broadcasted the first part of Chapter 15 of the Tyranny of God where I began going through the process in which religions, more specifically, Christianity and Islam have come to be the most powerful religions today. First, they establish their god and their scriptures as authorities. Then they demand people to take their god and their scriptures seriously. They encourage people to substitute the need for evidence with faith. They instil obedience. They discourage doubt and enquiry and they enforce regular meetings to keep the faith strong within the minds of their converts. They then proceed to protect beliefs and silence contradictory ideas. In this second part of the podcast, I will continue going through the steps in which these two major religions have come to dominate our way of thinking. This Sunday, 9th of February 2014, Part 2 of Chapter 15 of the Tyranny of God.

Marquez discusses how the two most dominant religions today: Christianity and Islam, have spread. We will see how they achieved this by simply looking at the way their memes work together. We will look at how their belief system is structured to understand what continues to enable and empower them to thrive in the minds of people as parents pass on their beliefs and ideas from generation to generation.

Religions are just human organisations and like other human organisations, they are under pressure to survive. To survive, they need believers to support them financially or otherwise. Thus, they act like memetic organisms. Like viruses, they replicate in the minds of people, influencing the actions and behaviour of people the world over.

Perhaps gods do not exist. We only believe in them if we make ourselves believe in them. We kill and die for these gods. The tragedy is that in our willingness to believe, we end up wasting and squandering our resources and our lives and of others', as we serve and worship these gods we have imagined. Today, Sunday, 9th of December 2013, we will discuss why our ancestors used religion.

It is a common for religious people to say that their god through scripture, gives us a way to live moral lives. But does morality really come from a Divine Being? In this podcast, we delve into this question regarding morality.

This week, we interview Shelley Segal. Shelley is a Melbourne based singer-songwriter who became involved in secular activism over three years ago after which she released her first album called 'An Atheist Album'.

TRANSCRIPT

This week, we will be interviewing Shelley Segal. Shelley is a Melbourne based singer-songwriter who became involved in secular activism over three years ago after which she released her first album called 'An Atheist Album'.

I have seen quite a few claims from those championing Islam to be scientifically enlightening, quoting Koranic verses that supposedly prove the Koran has known or predicted many of the Scientific discoveries modern scientist have made today. I found many of these claims dubious.

Professor Richard Dawkins did too and, limited to 140 characters on Twitter, he posted: "All the world's Muslims have fewer Nobel Prizes than Trinity College, Cambridge. They did great things in the Middle Ages, though".

This caused a massive uproar and many threw Dawkins a number of accusations including racism and bigotry. I think Dawkins removed the Twitter post but he wrote an article to explain and defend his tweet.

"In 1611, Galileo went to Rome to demonstrate his telescopic observations of Jupiter’s moons to a group of philosophers and mathematicians called Jesuit Collegio Romano, after publishing his findings the year before. It supported the idea of Copernicus and, in 1614, Father Tommaso Caccini (1574-1648) denounced Galileo’s works as heretical."
Source: Marquez Comelab, The Tyranny of God, 3rd Edition, p205.

Time is all we have and there are only so many tomorrows. In casting aside the illusions of another life, we will finally acknowledge the preciousness of this life and feel most grateful for it. Heaven is here. Eternity is now.

Egypt is struggling not to fall under Sharia Law. We were going to summarise the events of what is happening in Egypt however Vlogbrothers from YouTube already did this very well.

We would like reiterate that President Mosri made a decree in November to allow himself to be an authoritarian ruler. He is backed by the Muslim Brotherhood who wants Sharia Law to form the basis of how Egyptians are ruled. The passing of this decree will result in Egypt falling under the rule of Sharia Law. After the military deposed Mosri off his position as President, the Muslim Brotherhood began organising a campaign of violent protests and they vow not to stop until Mosri is back in power.

If you're an American and you want to ban Creationism and Intelligent Design in the science classroom as federal law, then here's a petition on the White House's website for it. They need 100,000 signatures by July 15, 2013.

A Jehova's Witness filmed up the skirts of hundreds of women and schoolgirls in central Wellington, and when visiting private homes to spread the faith.
Police believe at least 1000 women and girls could have been filmed by the man, 36, who would leave work at lunchtime to spy up their skirts on a handmade device attached to his briefcase. (Source)

On the afternoon of 22 May 2013, a British Army soldier, Lee Rigby of the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers, was killed by two assailants near the Royal Artillery Barracks in Woolwich, southeast London, in a terrorist attack.

When the police came, this is what transpired:

Here is a video including interviews of witnesses, where the crime was set, and the reaction from prominent officials.

The murderer said, "We apologise that women had to see this today but in our lands our women have to see the same. You people will never be safe. Remove your government. They don't care about you". This is to say that he justifies his actions due to British Soldier's presence in Arab lands.

Here is a discussion among Muslim clerics and leaders about the crime, one of whom support the murder as part of Jihad and the other two reject it as unjustifiable and say the sentiments and motives expressed by the murderer is not shared by many Muslims.

There have been reported cases of attacks against Muslims after this incident, varying from verbal abuse, pulling of head-wear and physical abuse.

It is disturbing, but not unexpected, that people like Michael Adebolajo think that killing a British soldier is justified because British soldiers are present in Arab lands. It is equally disturbing that there are people in the Muslim community who agree. It is important however, to stand side-by-side with Muslims who condemn and reject this crime for what it is. This is a crime of a man misguided by his religious beliefs, and those who led him to the dangerous conclusion that drove him to take Rigby's life.

Christian sect the Jehovah's Witnesses - with 64,000 active 'disciples' in Australia - are a cruel religion with no soul, according to Melbourne cultbuster Raphael Aron.

"I am still waiting for a justification for someone to be able to rip away a five or six year old child from their extended family because Mum or Dad have decided to leave the Jehovah's Witnesses," he said.

Taslima Nasreen, an award-winning writer, physician, Secular Humanist and human rights activist, writes about how Islamists in Bangladesh, where she was born, are killing atheists.

"Four people were killed and more than 200 injured in Bangladesh yesterday as hundreds of Islamists clashed with police in Dhaka and other major cities demanding execution of “atheist bloggers” they accused of blasphemy." (Read article)

Savita Halappanavar dies because she was in a hospital in a Catholic country with a Catholic Team that refused to abort her pregnancy even if it meant it would save her life. According to husband Praveen Halappanavar, Savita told her consultant that she is not Catholic. She is Hindu. The consultant replied, "I'm sorry, unfortunately it's a Catholic country... they can't abort when the foetus is alive".

The right to life? What about Savita's life? Where was this god of theirs when Savita's life was to be wasted for the sake of others' religious beliefs? Was this god happy for how these people have insisted on protecting the foetus by allowing the mother to die?

]]>The Negative Effects of ReligionThu, 15 Nov 2012 21:18:24 +1100Human beings maybe one of the earliest life forms to evolve in the Universehttp://reasonism.org/main-content/item/2699-human-beings-maybe-one-of-the-earliest-life-forms-to-evolve-in-the-universe
http://reasonism.org/main-content/item/2699-human-beings-maybe-one-of-the-earliest-life-forms-to-evolve-in-the-universe

We often wonder, if there is intelligent life on another planet somewhere in the universe. To date, we have no evidence that this is the case.

However…

We may soon discover that intelligent life, indeed, may be in it's ‘very young’ stage in the observable Universe. Its 200 billion galaxies show a clear potential to continue on as we see them today for hundreds of billions of years, if not much longer. Because planets and life are so young in our Universe, says Harvard's Dimitar Sasselov, perhaps "the human species are not late comers to the party. We may be among the early ones."

Julia Sweeney (God Said, "Ha!") performs the first 15 minutes of her 2006 solo show Letting Go of God. When two young Mormon missionaries knock on her door one day, it touches off a quest to completely rethink her own beliefs.

CERN has just issued one of the biggest announcements in Science in the last 40 years. They have discovered what seems to be the Higgs boson particle: a particle predicted by the Standard Model in Physics. More spectacularly, the Higgs Boson is what makes matter possible. Without it, no matter can exist. We, humans, cannot exist.

In trying to get a better appreciation for the significance of this event, I wanted to understand what all this was about and I found an animation put together by Jorge Cham of PhD Comics. In it, Daniel Whiteson condenses this complex subject in what I found to be a good starting point for everyday people like me.

We probably would need to do more reading about the whole thing but there is enough here to astound us and pique our interest. For example, to make everyday matter, we only need 3 particles:

The Electron

The Up Quark

The Down Quark

With Up Quarks and the Down Quarks, you can make Protons and Neutrons, the other components of atoms. So, we only need three to make up everything we know of that has mass. However -- here is the kicker -- Physicists have already discovered 12 other particles! How many more are there? What do they all do? What may we now know?

We received a message from Thom Landon. He said: "Your words, ideas and philosophy confirm what I have begun to understand. Thanks for putting up this site and I hope this note lets you know that in this difficult process of unlearning, your perspective is welcome and appreciated. When I found the words your write and speak, it was like my thoughts spoken aloud. It's good to know that the logical framework of reason can be seen and understood outside of the self." Here's the full message...

Marquez,

I read your works and listened to the youtube presentation and realized that I had gone through a process almost identical. I reject athiesm as a response to theism.

Your words, ideas and philosophy confirm what I have begun to understand. Reason is enough. All the rest is a game to be played or entertainment. The really great stuff that's happening now, the amazing discoveries aren't made with dogma, they are made through the tool of reason.

I am also not a scientist, but I know enough about science to realize that it offers the best and most reasoned explanation for all of the really important questions. Recently, I've started reading Sam Harris and Dan Ariely and the picture of the mind and why we act irrationally suddenly begins to make sense. The future philosophy of thought integrates the new ideas on how and why we process new information and why we act irrationally (individually) and how we can eliminate harm (collectively).

Thanks for putting up this site and I hope this note lets you know that in this difficult process of unlearning, your perspective is welcome and appreciated. When I found the words your write and speak, it was like my thoughts spoken aloud. It's good to know that the logical framework of reason can be seen and understood outside of the self.

Best,

Thom

REPLY

Hello Thom,

I appreciate your time sending your thoughts through. It helps me when I know that there are people out there who are hearing me and who are sharing the same thoughts, feelings and experiences with me. It spurs me to do more.

In 2010, I wrote an article about Australia's National School Chaplaincy Program, a Government program that funds $55M a year for Christian Chaplains to hang about in public schools. They are not qualified to counsel nor are they qualified t o provide psychological help. The only thing they can do really is to drive pupils to churches when they are 'lost'. Does this really help? Isn't there a much better way to help students with $55M a year?

At around the same time a father in Queensland, Mr Ron Williams, has taken the issue to the High Court. Today, the High Court has ruled that the National School Chaplaincy Program is constitutionally INVALID because it exceeds the Commonwealth's funding powers.

Voyager 1 and 2 are at the edge of our solar system, about to free themselves from the gravitational pull of our sun. These 'things' that we sent out in 1977 are finally about to embark on an interstellar journey. What a long ride it had been... and yet it is only the beginning of humanity's exploration of the universe.

The Global Atheist Convention was held in Melbourne last month. I'm glad to see that the Convention has grown a lot bigger since the last one in 2010. During the three-day event, I met one of the organisers of the Philippine Atheist and Agnostics Society ( PATAS), Marissa Torres Langseth. She is based in New York and she was organising an Atheist conference in Manila the week after. She told me the conference was going to be the very first Atheist Convention in South East Asia.

It is great to know that there is such an atheist movement in the Philippines, where I was born, where people's explanation for every aspect of their lives is dominated by religious thinking. A country where people would gather by the thousands to touch a statue representing Jesus Christ to thank it for their newborn baby or the job they have just secured. This is a country where, annually, many people think there is nothing absurd about having themselves or others literally crucified to a cross on Good Friday to re-enact the suffering of Jesus as they believed it happened.

After talking to Marissa, I felt comfort knowing there are others like me: other Filipinos who grew up with the same culture and religious background. They, like I am, are now coming to terms with the incredulity of the beliefs we were brought up with. This realisation, or enlightenment shall we say, is enough to motivate them to do something about it: be it posting a blog, participating in forums, or organising a Convention.

I tell this story to you to let you know that if you are a Filipino atheist, wherever you are in the world, you are not alone. Many others are asking the same questions as you are. Many are beginning to see that religion's answers to life's questions are no longer enough.

We, at Reasonism.Org, will begin putting together a list of Filipino atheist organisations on this website (as well as other atheists groups of course). Please send in details of your organisation in your local area and we will include it. By creating communities (online of offline) where freethinkers have a great time with like-minded people, we will provide for each other sanctuaries. We no longer need churches to feel we belong.

I am having a fantastic time travelling the universe with a new iPad app by Collins (HarperCollins), the BBC, Professor Brian Cox and Andrew Cohen.

It is a brilliant way to show people the massiveness and the grandure of the universe. To think that we are only one planet among many planets, circling a star among many stars, in a galaxy among many galaxies, clumped up in clusters and themselves in super clusters in an address in the universe called the Centaurus Great Wall!

In 1977, we launched Voyager 1 and 2. After 34 years, they still haven't exited the far reaches of our solar system. To date, they are currently within the "Heliosheath" region - the outermost layer of the heliosphere where the solar wind is slowed by the pressure of interstellar gas. This fact alone should remind us how long it might take for us humanity to be able to travel to the far reaches of space. It will certainly not be within our lifetimes. This at least, would be the next best thing.

We can at least now imagine what it might be like based on the evidence we have so far: from the light waves that has reached us from the depths of time and space.

In traversing this universe with this app, one cannot help but wonder. This app is exploring what is possible with the latest technology as a new medium to communicate and teach. Try it even if you are not into science or even if you are just mildly interested. It might just blow your mind!

As we commit to more and more projects, it gets harder to work on other things and occassionally, it pays to pause and assess the results and the effectiveness of each alternative. In my case, I have been involved in a non-profit organisation in the last few years since The Tyranny of God was released, initially as a Secretary and later on, to be its President. These activities do take time - perhaps a little too much time. You might have noticed that I have not blogged as frequently...

People who have worked as a committee member may have an idea of the rewards and also the frustrations of working in one. This month, I decided to re-allocate my hours I used to spend on organising and managing Committees to focussing on exploring more ideas, learning more about science and natural history, attend more events, see what others are up to and have the chance to write more.

An American Soldier - Spc. Jose Ramirez was murdered by another soldier - Justin Green. Green's siter believes he killed Ramirez "because Ramirez did not believe in God". "Green, his sister Brittany and friend Stephanie Heaston-Corral worked together to hide the body and clean up".

"After burying the body, the group went to Brittany's apartment, ordered a pizza and bread sticks with Ramirez's credit card, and Brittany signed it using Ramirez's last name."

"Texas Ranger Marshall W. Thomas claimed in his report that officers detected blood at a rural home in Petrolia, Texas after two individuals with knowledge of the crime came forward. They discovered the soldier's body buried face down in a shallow grave, with both of his legs sticking out of the ground, covered by a tire and random trash..."

Where is the power of religion to guide people to be moral? Where is this wise, loving god to guide Green away from committing such brutality?

"We hear so often about Muslims as victims of abuse in the West.... but in fact... Christians are being killed in the Islamic world because of their religion. It is a rising genocide that ought to provoke global alarm." Read more to see the list of attrocities against Christians in Africa, Asia and the Middle East.

"We hear so often about Muslims as victims of abuse in the West.... but in fact... Christians are being killed in the Islamic world because of their religion. It is a rising genocide that ought to provoke global alarm", wrote Ayaan Hirsi Ali in a recent article titled, The Global War on Christians in the Muslim World, published in Newsweek Magazine on the 6th of February 2012.

Most of this anti-Christian violence is a major and under-reported problem. I hope that by providing a list of examples Ayaan Hirsi Ali cited to make her point below, many of you will take enough interest to help raise awareness to this development.

Here is a list of attrocities against Christians in the Middle East, Africa and in Asia in recent years.

Boko Haram aims to establish Sharia in Nigeria. To do this, it has stated it will kill all Christians in the country. During 2011, the group has killed 510 people and burned down or destroyed more than 350 churches in 10 northern states.

In Sudan, the UN reports between 53,000 to 75,000 innocent civilians have been displaced after their their houses have been looted and destroyed.

In Egypt, more than 900 Iraqi Christians have been killed, 70 churches have been burned.

Pakistan has draconian blasphemy laws forcing the Christian minority live in perpetual fear of being killed on charges of blasphemy, without any hope of proper legal defense. A militant Muslim group of 10 gunmen attacked World Vision with grenades and killed 6 people and wounded 4, because they accused World Vision of subverting Islam even though World Vision was there to help the survivors of a major earthquake.

In Indonesia, the number of violent incidents committed against religious minorities increased by 40 percent from 198 to 275 between 2010 to 2011.

In Iran, dozens of Christians have been jailed for worshipping.

In Saudi Arabia, religious police raid the homes of Christians to bring them up on charges of blasphemy.

In Ethiopia, where the Muslims are in the minority, Church-burnings have become a problem.

This has to stop. What can we do? At the very least, we can start discussing the problem. Share Ayaan's article or this blog post on Facebook, Twitter, email and so on. And when someone mentions Islamophobia in your conversations, bring up the Christophobia that is going on today.

Islamic Terrorists have been link to sporadic violence in Uzbekistan for more than a decade. A man of god, Ulugbek Kodirov, entered the United States with a student visa but he never enrolled in school. He had the godly mission of killing Obama because he 'knew this was what he was supposed to do for Islam'. According to a plea deal, 'Kodirov said he did not care if he got shot and killed as long as he killed President Obama". Yesterday, he was put in jail for 30 years. He said he was acting at the direction of an Islamic terror group in his home country. The Tyranny of God.

My thoughts...

Religions are human insititutions, unable to guide human beings to live moral lives. There is nothing divine about them and as a symptom, they are as corruptible as everything else man-made.

Many religious people believe that their god can heal them. A speaker for the Healing on the Streets (HOTS) Bath in the UK for example says that "Christians believe in, pray for and experience God's healing". "We're Christians from churches in Bath and we pray in the name of Jesus. We believe that God loves you and can heal you from any sickness".

The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) in the UK concluded that the adverts being made by the (HOTS) - Bath were misleading.

I have read of an experiment conducted by a religious organisation to prove that prayer works in healing but caused them embarrassment when they found that prayer had a negative effect instead ( which some jokingly attributed to a performance anxiety effect caused by patients knowing that they were being prayed for).

So far, I am not aware of any experiment or study done on a large scale proving that prayers do heal. You can easily find articles dispute the methods of such experiments but none offered a way in which such experiments can be improved. Most simply finish off by saying: "Well the healing power is beyond science's ability to measure anyway". In other words, there is no scientific evidence for prayer's power to heal.

[If you know of any study or experiment that proves either way, please share.]

We love paperback but now with new technology making books more accessible and often at lower costs, The Tyranny of God is now available as an iBook/e-book on Apple's iTunes Store. This article takes you through how the e-book looks like on the iPad and a guide to finding the e-book on Apple's iTunes store.

We love paperback but now with new technology making books more accessible and often at lower costs, The Tyranny of God is now available as an iBook/e-book on Apple's iTunes Store. This article takes you through how the e-book looks like on the iPad and a guide to finding the e-book on Apple's iTunes store.

This is how it looks like on the iPad:

You can quickly navigate to any part of the book from the Table of Contents.

It has...

An icon at the top-left to go back to the Table of Contents

Diagrams, illustrations and images are shown as they are meant to show

Quick Page Navigation to 'flick through' the pages

Options to change the font size larger or smaller

Search the book

Bookmark the book

You can also click on any of the footnotes to read the footnote in full...

There is an article written by Eric Herschthal published on the 15th of December 2011 on thejewishweek.com titled: This Just In: God Exists! Or, The Latest Claims of Religion on Science. Herschthal was writing about the works of Alvin Plantinga, a theist philosopher from Notre Dame, who argues, it is theism, not naturalism, that deserves to be called ‘the scientific worldview’. Further, Plantinga argues that a higher power, cannot be proven to exist but then, there's no need to prove that he exists like the fact that one plus one equals two, there is simply no need to be proven true.

Like Herschthal, I disagree with Plantinga with a 'hmmm'.

However, Herschthal then continues to say that he is with Stephen Jay Gould on this issue. He writes:

Science and religion set out to address entirely different sets of questions. Both are concerned with answering profound and eternal truths about the world. But they are truths of different kinds. Science investigates truths about the physical world, while religion concerns philosophical truths.

This is where I disagree with Herschthal. I posted this comment on the article, I do not know if the news site will approve it, but I will record it here because it is an interesting discussion.

Interesting topic. I agree with you Eric when you say that religion is 'the scientific worldview' is preposterous. Unlike you however, I disagree with Gould's non-overlapping magisteria (NOMA) argument. Science and religion are concerned with answering profound and eternal truths about the world. The difference is -- religions especially Abrahamic religions -- says it already knows the truth.

One can argue for the existence of a deistic god and may still feel scientific about it because even though there is no evidence for the statement, it can be argued to be a hypothesis. But to offer theistic arguments for the existence and nature of the Abrahamic god is very unscientific. It is faith-based. Science is not faith-based, it is evidence-based. Therefore, science and religion are not mutually exclusive and they encroach in each other's territories because they both attempt to answer the same questions. And almost always, their answers to the same questions, conflict. Noma denies this. Yet, the conflict between science and religion has concrete effects. It plays out in our politics and in the way we are all governed, live our lives and treat other people. This eventually leads to people from both sides of the discourse feeling, rightly or wrongly, that they are denied their right to live according to their beliefs.

Religious dogmatism persist when people remain ignorant of their own history, of their own origins. Religionists, especially Young Earth Creationists, who believe that the Earth is less than 10,000 years old have their own versions of events. They tell us that we came from Adam and Eve and all the species today came from those that survived Noah's Great Flood. However, through the study of fossils, continental drift and our very own DNA, science tells us a different story: human evolution.

Find out how human beings evolved from earlier life forms on Earth for over 4.4 billion years, from single-celled organisms to the diverse multitude of species alive today. This article comes with a diagram of the evolutionary Tree of Life.

[Please give your browser a couple of seconds to load the larger image after which a zoom window should appear at the left of the image. Press "Ctrl and +" then "Ctrl + -" (or vice-versa) if needed to re-sync the zoom with your mouse movement]

In my book, The Tyranny of God, I went through how humans evolved from earlier species of life and how the evidence shows that all forms of life on Earth - living or extinct - came from the same source. This means that you and I, as well as all other human beings share a common ancestor with every animal and plant now living today. Isn't it remarkable to even consider that you once shared a common ancestor with your pet, if you have one, or with the plant that is outside your home?

To help us understand how this happened, I contacted Leonard Eisenberg, a science educator in the United States. He created a fantastic diagram depicting the evolutionary history of life as it happened here on Earth. I wanted to use it here to provide a graphical summary of our evolution.

The image shows how species of life evolved to other species over time. In using this image, remember that the x-axis, the horizontal line, is time. Unlike usual graphs where time 0 starts at the left and extends rightwards to the present, time on this chart, starts in the middle of the horizontal axis. Therefore, the events of approximately 4 billion years ago when Earth formed as a planet starts in the middle of the axis then as time goes by, it stretches out to both left and right.

I will go through the diagram with you. You can then zoom into the image to explore the details of our evolution. Please note that the diagram with its splitting 'branches of species' and the timescales given are not meant to be authoritative but rather just approximations of these major events in our evolutionary history.

4400 MYA (Million Years Ago): Earth is Formed

4000 - 3000 MYA: Life in its early forms originates (bacteria).

3000 - 2000 MYA: Oceans rust. Iron in the oceans at first floated around in the water. When the oxygen from photosynthesizing plants increased in the atmosphere, it combined with the iron to make rust.

2000 - 1000 MYA: Multi-celled organisms (Eukaryotes) began to evolve, their descendants later become the plants, algae, fungi, sponges, corals and all other higher life forms. Eukaryotes are the kind of cell (it has a nucleus) that makes up all living things except for the most primitive stuff like Bacteria and Archaea.

250 - 200 MYA: Early ancestors of dinosaurs and mammals began to appear.

200 MYA: 4th Known Mass Extinction

200 - 65 MYA: Species of early mammals diversified. These mammals were the ancestors of present-day bats, shrews, horses, camels, dogs, cats, rodents and rabbits.

65 MYA: The 5th Known Mass Extinction occurred, killing off the dinosaurs

65 MYA - Today: One variety of mammals diversified from tree shrews to lemurs, tarsiers, new world monkeys, old world monkeys, gibbons, orangutans, gorillas, chimpanzees and humans.

Today:

When dinosaur bones were first found, it was thought by human beings that they were placed under the rocks by God to test our faith in him. Many people still insist that the world is not older than 10,000 years. To them, humans do not share ancestors with earlier species and they are created by a god who created them in his/her own image. Further, the god in this belief system created the first woman, from the bone of the first man.

Okay, the last one was not on the diagram but just a poke at some people's insistence on their literal beliefs in ancient myths.

I was one of those people who did not know about this history. Despite having gone through primary school, high school and university, how can I not know when this knowledge had been accumulating for more than a hundred years? Sadly, I am not alone. There are plenty who still do not know or fully appreciate the gravity of this wonderful story. Having heard of evolution and accepting it as fact because scientists say it is true is one thing but to comprehend how it works to a point where it is hard to believe otherwise, is a different experience altogether.

In many schools around the world, parents and religions influence their children to rather believe in myths and deny the mounting evidence that we, human beings, evolved from earlier life forms. As a result, science teachers have to approach the subject tentatively and avoid having to say the truth to avoid confrontation. It is worse when they do not teach it at all. For me and many like me, we have been denied the right to know the truth.

This is why even if I am not a Science teacher, I am passionate about this stuff. Seriously, isn't it wonderful to know that indeed, we are all related, not just in some airy-fairy use of the word 'related', and not even as 'brothers and sisters' as poetically invoked by politicians and religious leaders in their speeches, but rather, we are literally cousins with every living thing on this planet. Yes genetic cousins! What is more, there is evidence for it! Apart from fossil evidence, the origins of the human race is spelt out in our DNA and in the DNA we share with every plant and animal alive today.

- Marquez Comelab

Special thanks to Leonard Eisenberg for the use of the poster and for casting a scientific eye on this article. Please visit his website at http://evogeneao.com/. There are interesting tid bits on his site. For example, the chimpanzee is our 240 thousandth cousin. The cat is our 27th million cousin. The octopus is our 300th million cousin. The large format copy of the poster featured above is also available on his site.

There are at least two Islamic parties in Egypt: the more pragmatic Muslim Brotherhood and the Al-Nour Party. The Al-Nour Party is the party that is pushing for a stricter interpretation of Islam be enforced in the country. To them, democracy is subordinate to the Koran.

A spokesman, Yousseri Hamad, says, "In the land of Islam, I can't let people decide what is permissible or what is prohibited. It is God who gives the answers as to what is right and what is wrong".

Here we go... another mere mortal pretending to be speaking and acting for some supernatural deity. Individuals or groups of individuals who want to install their own set of rules justify it by saying that what they say and do are the words and actions of their god. This allows them to violate the rights of others the freedom to think, let alone the freedom to speak out and their childrens' right to be properly educated.

Aliaa Magda Elmahdy, is a 20-year-old university student in Egypt. She maintains a blog and on Sunday, 23 rd of October, she posted nude photos of herself to show her “screams against a society of violence, racism, sexism, sexual harassment and hypocrisy”. This is significant, especially at a time when Islamists in Egypt are trying to secure power.

It takes the sacrifices of courageous people like Aliaa to challenge the thinking that tyrannises so many people in her part of the world. Click here to visit Aliaa Magda Elmahdy Blog.

Record numbers of young, white British women are converting to Islam. Of the British citizens going through the conversion, more than half were white and 75% of them were women, according to an article Richard Peppiatt, (Women & Islam: The rise and rise of the convert, published on The Independent. Many of them apparently find it a struggle to assimilate their previous beliefs with that of their newly adopted religion More than three-quarters told researchers they had experienced high levels of confusion after conversion, due to the conflicting ways Islam was presented to them.

Record numbers of young, white British women are converting to Islam. Of the British citizens going through the conversion, more than half were white and 75% of them were women, according to an article Richard Peppiatt, (Women & Islam: The rise and rise of the convert, published on The Independent. Many of them apparently find it a struggle to assimilate their previous beliefs with that of their newly adopted religion More than three-quarters told researchers they had experienced high levels of confusion after conversion, due to the conflicting ways Islam was presented to them.

It is a free world. You can convert to any religion you want but you have the right and obligation to yourself to know as much of it as you can. Make sure you have all the information at hand to make the right decision for yourself. Are you aware for example, that should you change your mind in the future, the penalty of apostasy in Islam is death?

In the Koran 2:217:

They ask thee concerning fighting in the Prohibited Month. Say: "Fighting therein is a grave (offence); but graver is it in the sight of Allah to prevent access to the path of Allah, to deny Him, to prevent access to the Sacred Mosque, and drive out its members." Tumult and oppression are worse than slaughter. Nor will they cease fighting you until they turn you back from your faith if they can. And if any of you turn back from their faith and die in unbelief, their works will bear no fruit in this life and in the Hereafter; they will be companions of the Fire and will abide therein.

The Tafsir al-Qurtubi, a classic and thoroughly mainstream exegesis of the Qur'an. About 2:217, Qurtubi says this:

Scholars disagree about whether or not apostates are asked to repent. One group say that they are asked to repent and, if they do not, they are killed. Some say they are given an hour and others a month. Others say that they are asked to repent three times, and that is the view of Malik. Al-Hasan said they are asked a hundred times. It is also said that they are killed without being asked to repent.

Qurtubi never says anything like "some say the apostate should not be killed." The only point of contention seems to be how long the Muslim must wait before he kills the apostate.

We hope that at least in countries like the UK, the US and Australia, people are able to 'moderate' their beliefs and not actually follow through and enforce their religious 'duties'. We know that at least with Christians, prescriptions such as these are largely ignored and disobeyed. Will Muslims go through a similar transition? My guess and my hope is yes... but so long as we remain to be largely secular.

Do you know of anybody who recently converted to Islam? What were there reasons? How did they find the transition?

Einstein's theories show that nothing can travel faster than light. However, just very recent results from CERN, the large Hadron Collider in Europe, show that Neutrinos they sent through the ground from Cern toward the Gran Sasso laboratory 732km (454 miles) away in Italy. They have re-checked their methods and their calculations to ensure that the results are correct and they are sending their results to other science agencies to independently verify their findings. This could well be one of the biggest discoveries in Science because its implications are enormous.

How? Well for many reasons. One example is that the idea of time travel (not merely changing speeds of time between different reference points) is currently deemed not possible because of the idea that nothing can go faster than the speed of light.

Also, by finding out why this could be, scientists might be able to discover more things we did not know about.

Update: 23 Oct 2011

Ronald van Elburg of the University of Groningen in the Netherlands posted in a paper posted to the physics pre-print website arXiv.org, argues that the Italian scientists failed to account for the fact that the GPS satellite they used as their timekeeping device is moving.

As of June 2011, scientists at CERN have succeeded in trapping atoms of anti-hydrogen for more than 15 minutes: sufficient time to study them in a little more detail.

I can at least try to let you know what I understand, in broad strokes, why this news item is important and hope to impart my sense of appreciation of this milestone.

The reason why this is important is because it is believed that the universe came into existence from nothing. Studies in Quantum Physics indicate that out of nothing, certain particles can come into existence for brief moments. They come into existence, however, with the presence of their anti-thesis. So in effect, +1 (Matter) and -1 (Anti-Matter) is still equal to zero. Perhaps the same had been true with the Big Bang, the only difference between is that for a very, very small percentage of all the particles that existed during the Big Bang a few managed to remain in existence because they did not manage to come in contact with their anti-thesis before their anti-thesis disappeared. What has remained is the matter that makes up everything in the universe today.

Here is a quick history of cats. I provide this here because of its reference to what Christians did to cats in the Middle Ages and the dire consequences it had.

65 million years ago, dinosaurs became extinct and mammals began to dominate the planet.

30 million years ago, the first true cat evolves from a tree-dwelling insect-eater in western Europe.

12 million years ago, cats evolve into five groups: Neofelis, Lynx, Panthera, Acinonyx and Felis.

10,000 years ago, Farming settlements in the Fertile Crescent in the Middle East began attracting mice as their food supply increases. Cats proved to be useful in keeping the food safe.

9,500 years ago: remains of a man and a cat buried together have been found, dating 9,500 years ago.

4,000 - 3,900 years ago, ancient Egyptians began keeping cats.

Around 3,500 - 3,000 years ago, Ancient Egyptians worship cats as gods and tried to prevent other nations from acquiring them. Having seen the effectiveness of cats to control rodents, traders smuggled them up the Nile to the coast where Green and Phoenican traders take the cats with them to Europe and the Middle East.

2,500 - 1,500 years ago, Cats spread throughout Europe and Asia through both trade and the expansion of the Roman Empire.

Around 1500 to 600 years ago, the Christian Church suspects cats are evil and starts a campaign to wipe them out. The drop in cat numbers allows rat populations to soar and rats help spread the plague that kills nearly a quarter of Europe's population in the Middle Ages.

500 years ago the present day, the cat is a favoured pet and the relationship he has with humans changes from one of working to one of companionship.

I am just reading about many scientifically-trained and educated individuals who studied science at post-graduate level, and thereafter, get involved in Creationist activities, espousing among many other ideas for example, that the Noah's Ark is true. They then sell books and other materials to children and their parents, propagating their ideas.

Bertrand Russell wrote:

"[I]t is not what the man of science believes that distinguishes him, but how and why he believes it. His beliefs are tentative, not dogmatic; they are based on evidence, not on authority or intuition."

When you have individuals who are educated in Science, or are working in Scientific endeavours telling us that Noah's Ark is true, it does not necessarily mean that their belief in Noah's Ark has any scientific credibility. What we need to ask is why they believe it. Do they believe it because the Bible says it is true or do they believe it because there's evidence for it.

For something to be science, it must use scientific methods to qualify mere assertions of beliefs from scientific theories.

Morality Does Not Come From Religion Lecture by Marquez Comelab, author of The Tyranny of God organised by The Atheist Society, conducted in the Unitarian Church in Melbourne, Australia. 8th March 2011.

It has always been proposed by the religious that without religion, humanity will succumb to chaos and destruction. In a lecture organised by The Atheist Society in the Unitarian Church in Melbourne on the 8th of March 2011, Marquez Comelab argues that religion is taking undue credit for something that is naturally human.

To argue his point of view, he begins by taking us back to envision ancient societies, discussing the Golden Rule, and three universal truths of human nature that allow, force and pressure us to behave. These three universal truths, he argues, predispose human beings to be moral.

Many people believe that if you do not believe in God, it would be hard for you to know what is right from wrong. But is this true? I believe that religion is getting undue credit for something that is naturally part of human nature.

Tomorrow, I will be discussing following topic: Morality Does Not Come From Religion

WHERE:

The Unitarian Hall110 Grey StreetEast MelbourneVictoria Australia

8th March 2011 8:00 PM to 10:00 PM

The talk will be for about 45 to 60 minutes followed by a Question and Answer session.

On Australia Day, 26th of January 2010, I joined a gathering among other Victorians to protest against the tactics used by religious organisations, specifically Catch The Fire Ministries in using scare tactics, instead of rational debate to discuss the issues that plague us today.

Here is a video of that day.

Unfortunately, issues like the National School Chaplaincy Program and the Internet Censorship Filter are not being debated now, with only a couple of weeks away from the election but I hope that videos like these over the next three years will help probe and investigate the impact of religious beliefs in our societies.

Please pass it around to your contacts or embed it to your site, blog or Facebook pages. Cheers!

There is a very important issue ‘invading' our schools at the moment: The National School Chaplaincy Program. It is important because it borders the separation between Church and State. Every parent who has a child in school will certainly have heard, or will hear, of it. In this article, I am going to briefly introduce the nature of this program and mention some numbers to illustrate the type of investment that we, as tax payers, have provided to the program. Thereafter, we will discuss whether this Program should continue or not.

The Government has already provided $165 million in the past three years to schools across Australia. So far, this fund has been distributed to about 2,700 schools. On average, therefore, each of the participating schools has received about $20,000 a year.

This program was due to end late 2010. However, last November, Kevin Rudd announced that the government will spend another $42 million to extend the program. Given that we are allocating about $55 million dollars a year on funding this program, it is worthy of examination.

Most of this fund is paid to ‘chaplains', who are mainly religious workers. Apparently, these ‘chaplains' are paid to provide ‘chaplaincy services'. Many chaplains are supplied by an organisation called the National School Chaplaincy Association: an association of Christian organisations that includes Scripture Union and GenR8.

What exactly are these services? Chaplaincy Services can be largely divided into two major categories: Pastoral Care and Spiritual Guidance [1].

PASTORAL CARE

Pastoral Care includes p roviding guidance to students on issues concerning human relationships, assisting school counsellors and staff in the provision of student welfare services, providing support in cases of bereavement, family breakdown or other crisis and loss situations; and being readily available to provide continuity and on-going support for individual students and staff where necessary.

In what ways are chaplains better at providing support in cases of bereavement, family breakdown or other crisis situations than any other human being who studied and gets paid to perform these jobs in the secular world? Aren't there existing individuals, groups, institutions and regulators in psychology, social work and counselling already working on these problems, having done research and developed systems and processes to administer this sort of help?

Since these chaplains are not qualified to give helpful advice – the likes of which are provided by qualified experts and professionals – what are they being paid to do, exactly?

SPIRITUAL GUIDANCE

Providing Spiritual Guidance includes:

• Supporting students to explore their spirituality

• Providing guidance on religious values and ethical matter

• Facilitating access to the helping agencies in the community both church-based and secular. (Please note that by law, chaplains are obliged to refer people to secular institutions to seek professional help anyway. Effectively, this provision simply makes it alright for chaplains to refer people to churches as well.)

ANALYSIS

Since chaplains cannot really help in a way that friends, families and professional experts help a particular individual, the only new purpose they serve is to guide people to churches. Is it not conceivable that the objectives of the program like the ones above, give rise to a cynical view of the role of Chaplains? If we re-phrase these statements, is it not more rational to believe the Chaplains are put in place to:

• Get students to ask questions that would lead them to doubt their beliefs

• Once students begin doubting their beliefs, chaplains then lead them to believe that morality comes from religion or that religion has all the answers they seek

• Once the students are emotionally or mentally destabilised, the chaplains refer students to churches

In my opinion, The National School Chaplaincy Programme is simply paying chaplains $55 million a year to be provided the opportunity to proselytise and recruit new members to religions.

Imagine an education system with Scientologists, Muslim Clerics and Christian Chaplains hanging around in schools competing for the fresh minds of young converts!

Apparently, in deliberating over this decision, Kevin Rudd funded a study to find out whether the Chaplaincy Program was working. This study was aptly named: The Effectiveness of Christian Chaplaincy in Government Schools. One of the two researchers involved was a Uniting Church minister employed by the Christian Research Association and the study was commissioned by the National School Chaplaincy Association itself. In other words: the very same people who stand to benefit directly from that extra funding have been asked to advise decision makers whether or not they should receive more funding. Of course they were going to give the Programme a glowing report with the highest marks!

Dr John Kaye (The Greens) criticised the study commissioned by the Chaplaincy Association for its unsound research methods which led to the conclusions that, “according to principals, 97% of chaplains have been effective” and that the Programme “enhanced linkages between community and schools”.

These claims are in stark contrast to the results of a separate survey conducted by Dr Philip Hughes (Edith Cowan University) and Professor Margaret Simms (University of New England), who approached 1,626 public schools with Christian Chaplains. In their survey, only 42% of the principals, less than 6% of the teachers and 2.5% of the parents actually responded [2].

On what information is our religious Prime Minister basing his decision to further the National Chaplaincy Programme? In the mean time, bible lessons are being taught in regular classes in Queensland [3], teachers are discriminating against atheist students and a school chaplain has been removed from her job over her suggestive online chats with a 12-year-old boy! [4]

CONCLUSION

The National Chaplaincy Program threatens the barriers that separate Church from State by paying $55 million a year to provide Christian Chaplains, and those who benefit from training and certifying them, the opportunity to proselytise and recruit new members to religions. It is wrong for any democratic and secular government to use tax payers' money to help them do it. It would be wrong for the rest of us to remain complicit in this state of affairs. Along with fellow Australians, I will be by the desks at the Atheist Convention to gather as much support against further funding of The National Chaplaincy Program as possible.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Marquez Comelab is a Melbourne Atheist and is the author of The Tyranny Of God: Liberating Ourselves From Our Own Beliefs . Visit WWW.REASONISM.ORG .

When I was thirteen years of age, my family migrated to Australia. I liked the fact that Australia was secular. Religion seemed to play little role in politics and in people's lives in general. In the years that followed, Australia continued to remain secular and as far as I was aware, religion did not play a major part in politics. I was always confident that other people's beliefs would never affect me, confident that religion will continue to remain separate from the laws of the land that ruled me and so many Australians. Now, I am no longer sure.

Overseas, there has been a worrying trend of religious institutions attempting to hijack governments and have laws changed to ones that suit their beliefs. This is made possible by providing simple-minded, outdated arguments to complex issues faced by societies. Unfortunately, these theocratic ideologies have arrived here in Australia.

What worries me is that religious institutions are becoming more assertive and they want to influence the type of laws we should obey. One of these issues is abortion: Should we allow women the choice of terminating unwanted pregnancies?

There are those of us who refuse to equate the removal, expulsion of a foetus or embryo to murder. And in doing so, we acknowledge that in reality there will be women and young girls who will get pregnant and, for one reason or another, want to abort their pregnancy.

Victoria has decriminalised abortion because many Victorians see it immoral and unjust for a society to deny women the right to choose what is right for them. Ultimately, isn?t it the women themselves who have to live with the consequences of this decision?

As a democratic society, we are continuously faced with difficult issues and equally valid opinions to consider. What I strongly disagree with is the type of tactics that some of the religious organisations use in having their way:

1. Using scare-mongering tactics to terrorise Australians into passing laws favourable to their religion and

2. Claim that their words and actions are the words and actions of their god.

Staying with the issue of abortion, there is one particular church that has come to light in recent times for its assertive push for using religion to influence politics: The Pentecostal Church of Catch the Fire Ministries. This organisation has been active in pushing its agenda against legalising abortion and gay marriage. This group has been successful in California, Arizona and Florida in the USA, for example, where they managed to deny same-sex couples the legal right to be recognised as a married couple by law. This denies them certain rights afforded to homosexual couples.

In the wake of the Black Saturday bushfires, the church leader of Catch The Fire Ministries, Pastor Danny Nalliah, claimed he had a dream on the 21st of October 2008. Apparently, he woke with "a flash from the Spirit of God: that His conditional protection has been removed from the nation of Australia, in particular Victoria, for approving the slaughter of innocent children in the womb"[1].

In other words, according to Danny Nalliah, his god became so angry with Victorians because they decriminalised abortion. He allowed the bushfires to ravage through the state to destroy 2,029 homes[2], displace an estimated 7562 people[3], kill 173 people[4] and injure 414 more. His god turned his back on Victoria as this horrific catastrophe unfolded. Nalliah said, "The Bible is very clear: If you walk out of God's protection and turn your back on Him, you are an open target for the devil to destroy"[5].

How appalling is it that some individuals along with various church organisations still choose to support him despite of his senseless remarks. Worse still, Danny Nalliah is accusing all those who disagree with him and his church's stance on abortion as being the ones to blame for the bush fires that took so many innocent lives. How sickening!

A year has passed and Victorians have heard no apologies from Pastor Nalliah nor from Catch The Fire Ministries. To the contrary, this year on Australia Day, 26January 2010, the church is organising their annual Australia Day Prayer Celebration where apparently the Lord Jesus Christ himself has seen it fit to honour Pastor Daniel Nalliah. In their own words:

It is with great joy that I write to inform you of an extremely exciting happening taking place on Australia Day 26th January 2010 in Melbourne. How good is our heavenly Father to bring from afar (USA) an honour for a passionate, deserving son of His!

We have therefore made space in the program of the Australia Day United Prayer Celebration for a special time where Pastor Daniel will be recognised with an Honorary Doctorate of Divinity Degree from Saint Thomas Christian College in Jacksonville, Florida, USA. I personally invite you to come and be part of this time of Divine Acknowledgement by God's hand.

Individuals and organisations reach the height of their arrogance when they proclaim they speak for gods.

I have never attended an organised protest before. But this Australia Day 2010, I will be packing my bags to join the many Victorians who will gather outside the Catch The Fire Ministry's Australia Day Prayer Meeting at the Springvale Town Hall.

For the first time in my life, I will stand alongside many Victorians to protest. My voice will join the many voices of other Australians who have come to say:

1. We have had enough of religious organisations like Catch The Fire Ministries, taking advantage of their congregations to vote and advance their political agendas.

2. We have had enough of false prophets proclaiming themselves to speak for gods, telling us that their will, is their god's will.

3. We have had enough of religions using fear to coerce people to vote their way, while completely diverting discussions away from core issues.

If you are reading this, I urge you to join me and stand against well-funded and well-organised religious organisations working in Australia to bring about an authoritarian rule of their gods. The time has come for us to defend the free-thinking, secular nature of a country we have known and come to love. We cannot sit idly and do nothing while these religions undermine the very foundations of what makes Australia great.

Together, we can protest for Australia on Australia Day and I hope to meet you there.

The Vice-Chancellor of The Australian Catholic University wrote an article referring to atheists as part of a plague, an infestation. Marquez Comelab warns us against the dangers of religious groups having the tendency to dehumanise any group of people who contradict their religion.

FULL ARTICLE:

Apparently, I am part of a plague: an infestation much like the bogong moths in Canberra and the frogs in biblical Egypt. I am an unwelcome and unlovely creature who has the awkward habit of turning up in bulk. Greg Craven, the vice-chancellor of the Australian Catholic University, asserts this in his article, A plague of atheists has descended, and Catholics are the target, published in The Age on the 4th of November 2009.

Waving the many metaphors Greg Craven has decided to use in his article, like likening atheists to cheap electric kettles, for example, I will focus on the major arguments he is making and write short rebuttals to these.

1. Atheists want everyone to know that they have not found God, and that no one else should.

As an atheist, my main motivation is not to stop other people from finding God, but rather, to discourage others from having a one-dimensional view of the world and encourage one that is enriched by the facts and evidence science presents to us, since many are in stark contrast to the many teachings of religion.

As an atheist, my arguments are not against one particular religion. Rather, it is against all beliefs that are merely started, asserted and replicated through superstition or indoctrination.

According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, there are more Catholics than any other religious group, in Australia. If Catholic doctrines are being criticised then it is likely because, in relation to other religions, Catholic doctrines are the most prevalent and most recognised the world over. Craven should recognise that it is the numerousness and the global ubiquitousness of Catholic doctrines that makes them easier to discuss.

Take, for example, the doctrine of Transubstantiation: the belief that when you swallow the bread and the wine in church, the bread and wine literally turn into the flesh and blood of Jesus. To me, this is an example of a religious belief that is not backed by evidence. I use it NOT because it is Catholic, rather because there is greater probability that more people have heard and can relate to it. Citing it will therefore likely get my point across.

3. Atheists are atheists as a way to make themselves feel immensely clever.

This comment reminds me of a school kid, who, after not having a good come-back in an argument with a mate, says: "You think you're smart now, don't ya?!" There is something peculiarly childish about such arguments, which is quite surprising coming from a Vice-Chancellor of a university.

4. Atheists do what they do because they hate Christians, as opposed to politely dismissing them.

As an atheist, I do not look at Christians as adversaries. From the tone of his article, Craven seems to look at the world in the simple terms of US-AND-THEM mentality. My mother is a believing Catholic and my father is Anglican. Most of my friends and relatives are Christians. I certainly do not hate them. I certainly do not hate you, Mr Craven. I simply want us, believers and non-believers, to continue our discussions in a way that is not divisive and dehumanising.

Like many citizens of this country and of this world, I am concerned with many issues humanity is currently dealing with. When atheists, including myself, express opinions that religion is at the heart of many of these problems like terrorism, stem cell research, abortion and condom use, we are entitled to express and argue for those opinions just as much as anyone is entitled to express and argue for theirs.

Referring to atheists as hateful bogong moths, frogs and noisy kettles, does two things: it takes the discussion away from the real issues and two, it dehumanises a group of human beings. Dehumanisation, Mr Craven, is a process utilised by groups like the Nazis against the Jews in the Holocaust and by the Hutus against the Tutsis in the Rwandan Genocide. Atheist or religious, Australians expect more from a Vice Chancellor of a university than to resort to such tactics.

]]>marquez@reasonism.org (Marquez)ArticlesFri, 13 Nov 2009 10:15:59 +1100Two Thousand Years Later - The Passion Of The Christhttp://reasonism.org/main-content/articles/item/68-two-thousand-years-later-the-passion-of-the-christ
http://reasonism.org/main-content/articles/item/68-two-thousand-years-later-the-passion-of-the-christFollowing the release of the film: The Passion Of The Christ, we should take this opportunity to remember what it was that Jesus Christ may have died for. Perhaps we can re-think and re-learn the message He had been trying to tell us two thousand years ago.

MAIN ARTICLE

The Passion of The Christ has caused a lot of discussions. Some people accuse the film to be anti-Semitic or that it has the potential to incite hatred and violence towards Jews. Other people object mainly to Mel Gibson's gruesome depiction of Jesus Christ's last 12 hours on earth in his latest film: The Passion Of The Christ. Though these are of importance, we should not allow Christ's main message to drown and be set aside in favor of our discussions of religion, politics, film-comparisons, film-critiques and censorship. We should take this opportunity to remember what it was that Jesus Christ died for. Perhaps we can re-think and re-learn the message He may have been trying to tell us two thousand years ago.

I would have preferred this paper to discuss only the main teaching of Christ and how it relates to us today; however I feel that I should address the two most popular discussions regarding the film before I can continue on. Was it anti-Semitic? I don't believe the film was anti-Semitic. The Jews had to make a decision then and they did it no differently to how we, as a society, conduct our affairs today. In the latter part of this document, I argue that there is no reason for non-Jews to blame the Jews for what had happened. Was the gore and violence of the film appropriate? Yes. I think that the gore and violence of the film was important in illustrating the sacrifice that Jesus had to make, and was willing to take, so that we would understand what he had been trying to tell us all along. The pain and suffering he had endured shows the amount of strength that is required to love - completely and truly.

Regardless of what your religious beliefs are, or whether you have a religion or not, let me first ask you to assume, just for this paper, to forget religion. Forget the notion that Jesus Christ was the Son of God. Forget the notion that he was sent here by a Divine Power. Let us just assume that he was a mortal man, made of flesh and blood, just like you and me. He saw the world differently however. He interpreted information, his experiences and his emotions differently to how most of us process our internal and external environments. As a result, he gained immense wisdom and knowledge beyond the comprehension of most of us. He tried to tell us something. He tried to share with us what he knew.

The main teachings of Jesus Christ revolve around the core idea of LOVE. Love everything. Love everybody. Even your enemies! If they hit you on one cheek, turn the other cheek. Like Buddha's message: Do NOT do unto others what you would NOT like others do unto you. Be compassionate towards all beings. That was what they taught: LOVE.

He believed that it is the only philosophy that will allow us all to achieve harmony and happiness in our universe and in our lives. No amount of hate should be allowed every day and in every way that we conduct ourselves. No matter what happens, we must not hate or wish malicious thoughts towards anything or anybody.

To spread that message, he spoke about it when he could, where he could. People flocked to the mountains and in the temples where he preached. A lot of his ideas fascinated people. They were new, bizarre and sometimes his ideas went against basic human instincts and the prevailing beliefs that people had at the time. He was a leader, like a shepherd guiding his herd of sheep. He led with utmost integrity.

We have had a lot of leaders in the past, now and we will continue to follow them in the future. They tell us one thing but they do not have the strength and courage it takes to refuse to do another. They contradict themselves and their ideals.

Is it only our leaders, celebrities and other prominent members of our society - whom we read about in the papers - who are at fault? No. Their faults are our faults. How is that? Because we still believe that it is OK to hate or express negative emotions towards others whom we feel have done us wrong or will do us wrong. We, as people, still exhibit little signs of compassion, consideration, thoughtfulness and understanding towards other people and other beings.

We experience negative emotions towards other people when they mock us, when they ridicule us, when they bully us, when they humiliate us, when they deny us justice or fairness, when they torture us, when they kill or threaten to kill our loved ones, or when they deny us anything else that we consider to be our 'human rights'.

"Of course", we say. "That's natural!"

That is exactly my point! Jesus Christ had to endure all that and yet he had gone through his last twelve hours without displaying any signs of anger, hatred, disappointment, greed or fear. In fact, during his crucifixion, he still asked that his enemies be forgiven for they knew not what they were doing. Who among us has the courage, strength and wisdom to be able to accept our predicaments like that?

Jesus Christ has shown us that we must love even our enemies, be wise enough to increase our capacity to understand and show compassion towards all beings...regardless of what happens.

The Jews at the time had to make a decision: to kill Jesus or not. What would have been the right thing for them to do? They did not know. If you were a common person in the streets of Jerusalem at that time and you were asked what you would like to happen to Jesus, what would you have said? For a lot of people, the information they had of Jesus Christ was very sketchy. He was whispered to be The Messiah. He had many controversial ideas but he seemed very wise and he had helped ease the misery of a lot of people. At the same time, Jesus was also accused of being a liar, a madman, a witch and a blasphemer. He had made Lazarus come back to life, walked on water and he had turned water into wine. Would you have believed those miracles? If they were not true, why would people have made them up? If they were true then definitely, Jesus was no ordinary man. And if he had powers like that, what else was he capable of doing? What if he was the Devil in disguise? Maybe it was right that he be killed while his threat could still be subdued. There were so many people chanting for his death. Surely their reasoning would not have been baseless.

It was not an easy decision for any person or any group of people to make. Even Pontius Pilate who was in a position to have all the information in the land to make a decision, was torn what to do with Jesus. Pilate was like the President of the United States, with all the advisers, intelligence agencies and reporters at his disposal. Yet, he did not know what he was supposed to do.

The decision came to pass to crucify Jesus. The High Priests were threatened of him. Pontius Pilate weighed his decision and allowed the people to make the choice for him. Those who were most vocal and more aggressive in their belief that Jesus Christ ought to die, got their way that day. There may have been people who probably felt strongly against it but they were not willing or able to do anything to stop it. Others were not there probably because they allowed themselves to be in a position where they knew too little information to have an opinion at a time when it was crucial that they did. Sadly, many may not just have cared.

Think of all current issues we face. There are some of us who choose FOR or AGAINST a motion. Others do not choose, however, by not choosing, they have also made a choice. As one global voice, we are all divided in our opinions towards most of these issues. And only with hindsight, can we truly assess the impact of the choices we have made. It is the same dilemma that the Jews faced then.

Should we look outside ourselves to see whom we can blame for the killing of Jesus? No. The Jews killed Jesus, a fellow Jew, but how different are we when we kill or hurt our own? How different are we when we allow others to suffer because it was not our problem or because we did not yet know enough about the problem?

Added with our inability to be wiser than we are to accept and feel compassion towards all beings, it was our 'human nature' to hate and inflict pain and suffering on others that crucified Jesus Christ. That 'human nature' still remains unchanged even after two thousand years. What Jerusalem was then is what the world is now. And it will be that way forever...until we change.

- END OF ARTICLE -

Please include the paragraph below if you are republishing this article online or in print.

About The Author:

Marquez Comelab wrote this article in 2004, before he wrote his book: The Tyranny of God.

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]]>ArticlesSat, 28 Mar 2009 21:48:09 +1100Freedom Of Speech, Religion And The United Nations (AU)http://reasonism.org/main-content/articles/item/56-freedom-of-speech-religion-and-the-united-nations-au
http://reasonism.org/main-content/articles/item/56-freedom-of-speech-religion-and-the-united-nations-auOn the 24th of November 2008, the U.N. passed a draft resolution against blasphemy. On Thursday, 26th of March, it was passed as a ?non-binding? resolution: a step closer to being a binding resolution. In this article, Marquez Comelab, author of The Tyranny Of God, asks who really needs protection from whom? This is not about protecting people from other people. This is about taking away our right to think for ourselves and to speak our minds.

On the 24th of November 2008, the U.N. passed a draft resolution against defaming religion. It was sponsored by the 57-member Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC). They want nations to pass legislation against blasphemy. On Thursday, 26th of March, it was passed as a ?non-binding? resolution: a step closer to being a binding resolution. At this point in time, it is optional for each member nation of the U.N to adopt this resolution. There is no doubt that the OIC will continue to push for its enforcement worldwide.

I write this article because I believe the motive behind the efforts of the OIC is sinister. I want to ensure that you, the reader, are aware of this development because if the OIC gets its way, your right to express your opinion is at risk. It has happened before and it continues to happen in totalitarian regimes all over the world today. Only this time, it has the backing of the U.N.

Before I continue, let me be clear:I also want to protect human beings from being discriminated against and they should NOT be subject to physical violence because of their religious beliefs, or lack of them. This issue, however, is not about protecting people from other people. It is about taking our right to think for ourselves and to speak our minds.

A blasphemer is someone who speaks of (God or a sacred entity) in an irreverent, impious manner.[1] Irreverent means ?lacking or exhibiting a lack of reverence: disrespectful?.[2] Impious refers to irreligiousness.[3] Many works of art, film and literature blaspheme a particular god or religion.

The justification behind the recent push for blasphemy laws is to avoid instances where the feelings of Muslims are hurt because of impious statements about certain things they consider sacred or holy.

I can draw three examples in recent history that have added urgency to the cause of the OIC to push for laws that protect Islam from free enquiry and criticism:

The cartoons drawn by Kurt Westergaard

The film, Submission, by Theo Van Gogh and Ayaan Hirsi Ali

The film, Fitna, by Geert Wilders

I will discuss these cases one by one. In the process, I ask you:

Who needs protection from whom?

Were these works created purely to incite or provoke violence from Muslims or were they created out of curiosity, to ask questions and seek the truth?

Danish Cartoons by Kurt Westergaard

Perhaps the most popular incident most of us have heard about was that of Danish Cartoonist, Kurt Westergaard. He created the controversial cartoon of the Muslim prophet, Muhammad, wearing a bomb as a turban.

After the publication of his cartoons, Muslims worldwide were enraged. In two days of heavy rioting, five people were killed in two major cities and a private property, worth millions, was torched in Pakistan.[4]

I have collected what some banners and chants said in these protests[5]:

May they bomb Denmark so we can invade their country and take their wives as war booty

On February 12, 2008, Danish Security and Intelligence Service, PET, arrested three people: two Tunisians and one Dane of Moroccan origin. They were planning to murder Westergaard. In a statement on Jyllands-Posten's website, Mr Westergaard said: ?Of course I fear for my life when the police intelligence service say that some people have concrete plans to kill me??.[6]

Submission by Theo Van Gogh and Ayaan Hirsi Ali

The film, Submission, is a 10-minute film directed by Theo Van Gogh and written by Ayaan Hirsi Ali. It was shown on the Dutch public broadcasting network (VPRO) on August 29, 2004.

The film tells the story of four fictional characters played by a single actress wearing a veil, but clad in a see-through chador, her naked body painted with verses from the Koran. The characters are Muslim women who have been abused in various ways. The film contains monologues of these women and dramatically highlights three verses of the Qur?an, 4:34, 2:222 and 24:2 that authorise mistreatment of women, by showing them painted on women?s bodies.

Hirsi Ali, now a Muslim atheist, was motivated to make the film because of the injustice she saw. She said:

It is written in the Koran a woman may be slapped if she is disobedient. This is one of the evils I wish to point out in the film.[7] If you are a Muslim woman and you read the Koran, and you read in there that you should be raped if you say ?no? to your husband, that is offensive. And that is insulting.[8]

In her book, Infidel, Hirsi Ali tells us what happened two months after the film was released:

Theo van Gogh got up to go to work at his film production company in Amsterdam. He took out his old black bicycle and headed down a main road. Waiting in a doorway was a Moroccan man with a handgun and two butcher knives.

As Theo cycled down the Linneaeusstraat, Muhammad Bouyeri approached. He pulled out his gun and shot Theo several times. Theo fell off his bike and lurched across the road, then collapsed. Bouyeri followed. Theo begged, ?Can?t we talk about this?? but Bouyeri shot him four more times. Then he took out one of his butcher knives and sawed into Theo?s throat. With the other knife, he stabbed a five-page letter onto Theo?s chest. The letter was addressed to me.

After Theo?s murder, Hirsi Ali went into hiding.

Fitna by Geert Wilders

Geert Wilders, a Dutch politician and member of the Dutch Parliament since 1998, is another fighter for freedom of speech. In 2008, he released a short film titled Fitna. Fitna means ?disagreement and division among people? in Arabic. Wilders said the 15-minute film showed how verses from the Qur?an are being used today to incite modern Muslims to behave violently and antidemocratically based on those verses. When you take a look at his film, it is the Koranic quotes and the zealous personalities captured in the film that incite violence, not Geert Wilders.

Fitna was released on the Internet on the video sharing website Liveleak, after which it was immediately removed because of serious threats being made to staff. After security upgrades to ensure the safety of the staff at Liveleak, Fitna was re-released.

Prior to the release of the film, Geert Wilders did an interview with Fox News where he made statements relevant to our discussion.

When asked why he would release a film with all these threats of riots on the streets, he responded:

That [threats are being made] just proves my point even more, that it is needed, a lot, to make such a movie. Indeed, only the proposition that I was going to make a movie [got] the Dutch government panicking, talking to imams all over the country, Muslim groups threatening to go to courts to prevent the movie being published, [it is as if] we have no freedom of speech here in the Netherlands. All the reactions, even before the movie is finished, let alone broadcasted on television, prove my point that it is very needed to make [such] a movie. People should bear some criticism also in the Muslim community

When interviewed, Geert Wilders already lived three years of his life under high security. He was asked by the interviewer whether it was more prudent for him to ?temper? what he was saying, just a little bit. Wilders response was:

If I do that, if I would moderate my voice or maybe stop talking like that, then the people who are not using democratic means, but undemocratic means ? like the death threats that I am getting everyday ? then, those people, would win.

In a democracy, if you are against somebody, you use your freedom of speech. Go and debate, write an article or vote for a party that thinks differently? This is civil society. This is everything that should be done in a democracy.

More than half a million people voted for my party and me personally, so I have an obligation to the voters who expect me not to stop saying what I really think. If I stop, then I would not only be playing a nasty game to my voters, I would also give a signal to everybody who says, ?If you say what we don?t like, we will kill you, behead you or do terrible things to you?, that they are winning.[9]

Let us reflect on these three cases for a moment. The publishing and drawing of the cartoons was offensive to many Muslims and they are all within their rights to protest. What is a separate issue, however, is the way most of the protests have been conducted. The slogans and the chants, themselves, were criminal. They incited and spread hate, murder and violence.

What is most unacceptable for a society that values freedom of expression is that three men plotted to murder the cartoonist. Westergaard was lucky to have been protected by the Danish police. Unfortunately for Theo Van Gogh, the Dutch police was not there to save him.

I would like you to watch Submission and Fitna, which you can find for free on YouTube. Watch them and make up your own mind because to me, these are works inspired by their creators? genuine sense of enquiry and wonder, stemming from their desire for a more equitable, peaceful world.

Like I wrote earlier, the push for anti-blasphemy laws is not about protecting people from other people. It is about immunising religious ideas from intellectual probing and enquiry. We cannot protect ideas from other ideas. The ability to explore a full range of ideas is important because truth cannot be arrived upon unless all points are considered first.

John Milton (1608-1678) said, if facts are laid bare, truth will defeat falsehood in open competition, but this cannot be left for any individuals, or a government, to determine. It is up to each individual to uncover their own truth and no one is wise enough to act as a censor for all individuals, not even the U.N.

To those who voted for this resolution, I say, believing in freedom of speech means believing in freedom of speech of views you do not like. By passing anti-blasphemy resolutions, such as these, the U.N seems to expect us all to accept everything we are told to believe, because if we show dissent or express our opinions against these beliefs, we will get prosecuted as blasphemers.

Now that most of us live and share our cities with people from many varying religious beliefs, it is very important that we can discuss our religious beliefs, or lack of them, openly and maturely.

It is obvious that not all existing religions are right. Either one of them is right or none of them are. This implies that many of us currently believe in absurdities and this is very dangerous because ?those who believe absurdities will commit atrocities? (Voltaire).

To conclude, I echo what H.L. Mencken said eighty-two years ago:

Individuals have the right to harbour and indulge their imbecilities as long as they please, provided only that they do not try to inflict them upon others by force. They have a right to argue for them as eloquently as they can, in season and out of season. They have a right to teach their religion to their children. But certainly they have no right to be protected against the free criticism of those who do not hold them. They have no right to demand that they be treated as sacred. They have no right to preach them without challenge.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Marquez Comelab is the author of The Tyranny Of God. In his book, he argues that if we believe that God truly exists, and his nature is as asserted by the Bible or the Koran, then it is only logical to assume that all laws must reflect God?s will. By its very nature, therefore, the rule of God is totalitarian: the exact opposite of democracy. See: www.reasonism.org.

(If you are concerned, you can help others be more aware of this issue. You have permission to republish this article online or in print, on blogs, forums or personal pages, commercially or not, on the condition that it is published in full and the information about the author is included.)

[9] I have paraphrased the last paragraph for clarity. The original transcript is this: ?So, if I stop saying what I really think, more than half a million people my party and me personally, so I also have an obligation to the voters who expect this from me? If I do not do that, I would not only play a nasty game to my voters but I would also give a signal to everybody who says, ?If you say what we don?t like, we will kill you, behead you or do terrible things to you?, that they are winning.?

In this podcast, I discuss how our ancestors, before they created religions, have come to realise that it is indeed wise to treat others the way you want to be treated. Today, Sunday, 3rd November 2013, Chapter 11 of the Tyranny of God, Why We Are Moral.

It is often said that a particular religion teaches its people how to live moral lives. Many people claim that religion is the metaphorical light that guides people to live wise, moral and satisfactory lives. Is this true though? Are we not moral without religions? Have we not been moral even without religions? These are the sorts of questions I want to delve into today, Sunday, 27th of October 2013, Chapter 10 of the Tyranny of God, Early Human Societies.

TRANSCRIPT

Currently, we are broadcasting the audiobook version of The Tyranny of God. In Chapter 8 we covered memes. Memes include ideas, songs, rituals and jokes. Memes are copied from one brain to another. In Chapter 9, I went through two types of memes: beliefs and delusions. Beliefs and delusions are powerful because they make us act on them. What we believe influences how we treat other people. Individuals can maintain beliefs that are irrational, delusional and destructive. Therefore, just because we believe in something it does not make it true. In the last chapter, we asked, how, then, can we be certain that we do not choose our beliefs simply to delude ourselves in justifying and rationalising our thoughts, emotions, behaviour, attitude and actions?

Many of us suppose that because religious beliefs are adopted by many, they are assumed to be wiser, less deceiving and less misleading. And most of the time, we do not question this do we? People say things like, "I do or do not do this or that because of my religious beliefs". For example, someone might say, "I'm a Jehovah's Witness so I don't believe in Blood Transfusions". Most of the time, we might not advance the discussion further. If we do, we might ask something like, "why not?". The answer we get is usually something we do not comprehend, or find irrational or just confusing. But most people I've noticed, shy away from enquiring further because of not wanting to offend or seemingly ridicule the other person. We will come back to this in later chapters when I will argue that we as individuals and as societies should, and ought to question these beliefs for the sake of finding out what is true.

Before we do that, however, I would like to veer off to another piece of this big puzzle we are trying to put together. It is often said that a particular religion teaches its people how to live moral lives. Many people claim that religion is the metaphorical light that guides people to live wise, moral and satisfactory lives. Is this true though? Are we not moral without religions? Have we not been moral even without religions? These are the sorts of questions I want to delve into today, Sunday, 27th of October 2013, Chapter 10 of the Tyranny of God, Early Human Societies.

In Chapter 8 of the Tyranny of God, we got thinking about memes. We generally defined memes to be anything that we, human beings can copy. Memes including ideas, stories, rituals and parables made up by people and got copied from one mind to another. Over generations, these memes join up with memes that are compatible or they may also make new memes conceivable. The idea that there is a soul for example, makes the idea of life after death, heaven and hell possible. These in turn makes it possible for gods to exist and we looked at all the different conceptions of god throughout the world. Religions embody and codify these conceptualisations of gods which is an argument I will delve into in later chapters.

However, before we proceed further, in this week's podcast, we will first discuss beliefs and delusions because they are two most powerful types of memes that influence our actions, thoughts and behaviour. This Sunday 20th of October 2013, Chapter 9 of The Tyranny of God: Beliefs and Delusions.

TRANSCRIPT

Hello, this is Marquez from Reasonism.Org and welcome to Reasonism Radio. Reasonism Radio is a podcast for free-thinkers, non-believers, Reasonists, atheists and religious believers alike. You can listen to our podcasts by subscribing on iTunes or by visiting our website at Reasonism.Org.

Currently, we are broadcasting the audiobook version of The Tyranny of God. In Chapter 8 of the Tyranny of God, we got thinking about memes. We generally defined memes to be anything that we, human beings can copy. Memes including ideas, stories, rituals and parables made up by people and got copied from one mind to another. Over generations, these memes join up with memes that are compatible or they may also make new memes conceivable. The idea that there is a soul for example, makes the idea of life after death, heaven and hell possible. These in turn makes it possible for gods to exist and we looked at all the different conceptions of god throughout the world. Religions embody and codify these conceptualisations of gods which is an argument I will delve into in later chapters. However, before we proceed further, in this week's podcast, we will first discuss beliefs and delusions because they are two most powerful types of memes that influence our actions, thoughts and behaviour. This Sunday 20th of October 2013, Chapter 9 of The Tyranny of God: Beliefs and Delusions.

Currently, we are broadcasting the audiobook version of The Tyranny of God. In Chapter 7 of the Tyranny of God, we got thinking about language. In our quest to understand human nature and the nature of religions, it is important to realise that language helps if not facilitates much of the way we think. In this chapter, I go through memes. Discussions of memes are important because a few chapters later, I argue that much like living organisms are made up of genes, religions are non-living organisms made up of memes. This Sunday 12th of October 2013, Chapter 8 of The Tyranny of God: Memes.

TRANSCRIPT

Hello, this is Marquez from Reasonism.Org and welcome to Reasonism Radio. Reasonism Radio is a podcast for free-thinkers, non-believers, Reasonists, atheists and religious believers alike. You can listen to our podcasts by subscribing on iTunes or by visiting our website at Reasonism.Org.

Currently, we are broadcasting the audiobook version of The Tyranny of God. In Chapter 7 of the Tyranny of God, we got thinking about language. In our quest to understand human nature and the nature of religions, it is important to realise that language helps if not facilitates much of the way we think. In this chapter, I go through memes. Discussions of memes are important because a few chapters later, I argue that much like living organisms are made up of genes, religions are non-living organisms made up of memes. This Sunday 12th of October 2013, Chapter 8 of The Tyranny of God: Memes.

Last week, we defined what we mean when we use the word God and Religion in the context of this book. By the word God, we are mainly referring to the Theistic concept of God. That God is a supernatural being, who created the universe, watches our every move, listens to our thoughts and punishes or rewards us after we die. Jews, Christians and Muslims believe in a Theistic as opposed to a Deist or a Pantheist concept of God. These three religions are monotheists. They believe in only one god. We will refer to them as Abrahamic religions because they all trace their origins to a man named Abraham. Our use of the word religion in my book refers to these Abrahamic Religions not necessarily other types of religions like those found in India or Asia.

In understanding religion, I believe we need to understand how we think. Since language determines how we think, I deem it necessary to touch on the subject of Language. This Sunday 6th of October 2013, Chapter 7 of The Tyranny of God: Language.

TRANSCRIPT

Hello, this is Marquez from Reasonism.Org and welcome to Reasonism Radio. Reasonism Radio is a podcast for free-thinkers, non-believers, Reasonists, atheists and religious believers alike. You can listen to our podcasts by subscribing on iTunes or by visiting our website at Reasonism.Org.

Currently, we are broadcasting the audiobook version of The Tyranny of God. Last week, we defined what we mean when we use the word God and Religion in the context of this book. By the word God, we are mainly referring to the Theistic concept of God. That God is a supernatural being, who created the universe, watches our every move, listens to our thoughts and punishes or rewards us after we die. Jews, Christians and Muslims believe in a Theistic as opposed to a Deist or a Pantheist concept of God. These three religions are monotheists. They believe in only one god. We will refer to them as Abrahamic religions because they all trace their origins to a man named Abraham. Our use of the word religion in my book refers to these Abrahamic Religions not necessarily other types of religions like those found in India or Asia.

In understanding religion, I believe we need to understand how we think. Since language determines how we think, I deem it necessary to touch on the subject of Language. This Sunday 6th of October 2013, Chapter 7 of The Tyranny of God: Language.

In Chapter 1, we discussed the origins of the Universe. In Chapter 2 we discussed the origin of life. In Chapters 3 and 4 we went through Genetics and how evolution works through Natural Selection. Last week, we concluded Chapter 5 titled How Life Evolved on Earth.
So far, our discussions were purely to establish our natural history based on the evidence, proof and reason derived what we know of fossils, biology, geology, physics, chemistry and other branches of knowledge.

This Sunday 29th of September 2013, we draw attention to understanding the nature of religion. Here now for you, Chapter 6 of The Tyranny of God: Respite.

TRANSCRIPT

Hello, this is Marquez from Reasonism.Org and welcome to Reasonism Radio. Reasonism Radio is a podcast for free-thinkers, non-believers, Reasonists, atheists and religious believers alike. You can listen to our podcasts by subscribing on iTunes or by visiting our website at Reasonism.Org.

Currently, we are broadcasting the audiobook version of The Tyranny of God. In Chapter 1, we discussed the origins of the Universe. In Chapter 2 we discussed the origin of life. In Chapters 3 and 4 we went through Genetics and how evolution works through Natural Selection. Last week, we concluded Chapter 5 titled How Life Evolved on Earth.
So far, our discussions were purely to establish our natural history based on the evidence, proof and reason derived what we know of fossils, biology, geology, physics, chemistry and other branches of knowledge.

This Sunday 29th of September 2013, we draw attention to understanding the nature of religion. Here now for you, Chapter 6 of The Tyranny of God: Respite.

Last week, we continued listening to how life began on Earth. We picked up our story from the Teleostomes, a species of animals that evolved into the ray-finned and fleshy-lobed fish which later developed into terrestrial vertebrates, tetrapods, amphibians, reptiles and mammals. Some of these mammals evolved into primates which include monkeys and apes. We pick up our journey of our human evolution after introducing our Hominini ancestors and we discussed the findings of Dr. Zeresenay Alemseged of the Max Plank Institute about the remains of a girl from 3.3 million years ago that looked human in many ways.

This Sunday 22nd of September 2013, we conclude our journey of human evolution with Part III of Chapter 5 of The Tyranny of God: How Life Evolved On Earth.

TRANSCRIPT

Hello, this is Marquez from Reasonism.Org and welcome to Reasonism Radio. Reasonism Radio is a podcast for free-thinkers, non-believers, Reasonists, atheists and religious believers alike. You can listen to our podcasts by subscribing on iTunes or by visiting our website at Reasonism.Org.

Currently, we are broadcasting the audiobook version of The Tyranny of God. Last week, we continued listening to how life began on Earth. We picked up our story from the Teleostomes, a species of animals that evolved into the ray-finned and fleshy-lobed fish which later developed into terrestrial vertebrates, tetrapods, amphibians, reptiles and mammals. Some of these mammals evolved into primates which include monkeys and apes. We pick up our journey of our human evolution after introducing our Hominini ancestors and we discussed the findings of Dr. Zeresenay Alemseged of the Max Plank Institute about the remains of a girl from 3.3 million years ago that looked human in many ways.

This Sunday 22nd of September 2013, we conclude our journey of human evolution with Part III of Chapter 5 of The Tyranny of God: How Life Evolved On Earth.

Last week, we began listening to how life began on Earth. Life began as a prokaryote, a single-celled organism to a multi-celled organisms referred to as eukaryotes. With the production of oxygen and the ozone layer, life could flourish first from the seas then later, on land.
Descendants of the early eukaryotes evolved having flagellate cells which propel themselves with a whip-like organelle called a flagellum behind them. These opisthokonts gave rise to animals: animals that evolved bilaterally-symetrical organisms of which some later evolved to deuterostomes, chordates, craniates, vertebrates and jawed vertebrates. Jawed vertebrates later evolved to the teleostomes.

This Sunday 15th of September 2013, we continue our journey of human evolution, Part II of Chapter 5 of The Tyranny of God: How Life Evolved On Earth.

TRANSCRIPT

Hello, this is Marquez from Reasonism.Org and welcome to Reasonism Radio. Reasonism Radio is a podcast for free-thinkers, non-believers, Reasonists, atheists and religious believers alike. You can listen to our podcasts by subscribing on iTunes or by visiting our website at Reasonism.Org.

Currently, we are broadcasting the audiobook version of The Tyranny of God. Last week, we began listening to how life began on Earth. Life began as a prokaryote, a single-celled organism to a multi-celled organisms referred to as eukaryotes. With the production of oxygen and the ozone layer, life could flourish first from the seas then later, on land.

Descendants of the early eukaryotes evolved having flagellate cells which propel themselves with a whip-like organelle called a flagellum behind them. These opisthokonts gave rise to animals: animals that evolved bilaterally-symetrical organisms of which some later evolved to deuterostomes, chordates, craniates, vertebrates and jawed vertebrates. Jawed vertebrates later evolved to the teleostomes.
This Sunday 15th of September 2013, we continue our journey of human evolution, Part II of Chapter 5 of The Tyranny of God: How Life Evolved On Earth.

Last week, we listened to Chapter 4 on Natural Selection. We needed to find a way to understand how evolution works, because it is often misunderstood as a force that somewhat ‘mutates’ or ‘morphs’ plants and animals into other species. Evolution works through Natural Selection. The plants and animals that thrive in a particular environment are those with genes that help them survive, adapt and reproduce. Those that do not, have less offspring and will eventually die. The genes that are helpful to this end survive and are passed on to the next generation of plants and animals. The genes that are not helpful will reduce in number and risk extinction.

The next thing we need to look into is how organisms of animals evolved here on Earth based on the works of scientists in multiple fields of study. This chapter of the book is quite extensive and in the audiobook, it is about an hour long. To keep with standard lengths of podcasts, we will divide it in roughly 20 minute segments. So here now, for you, this Sunday 8th of September 2013, Chapter 5 of The Tyranny of God: How Life Evolved On Earth.

TRANSCRIPT

Hello, this is Marquez from Reasonism.Org and welcome to Reasonism Radio. Reasonism Radio is a podcast for free-thinkers, non-believers, Reasonists, atheists and religious believers alike. You can listen to our podcasts by subscribing on iTunes or by visiting our website at Reasonism.Org.

Currently, we are broadcasting the audiobook version of The Tyranny of God. Last week, we listened to Chapter 4 on Natural Selection. We needed to find a way to understand how evolution works, because it is often misunderstood as a force that somewhat ‘mutates’ or ‘morphs’ plants and animals into other species. Evolution works through Natural Selection. The plants and animals that thrive in a particular environment are those with genes that help them survive, adapt and reproduce. Those that do not, have less offspring and will eventually die. The genes that are helpful to this end survive and are passed on to the next generation of plants and animals. The genes that are not helpful will reduce in number and risk extinction.

The next thing we need to look into is how organisms of animals evolved here on Earth based on the works of scientists in multiple fields of study. This chapter of the book is quite extensive and in the audiobook, it is about an hour long. To keep with standard lengths of podcasts, we will divide it in roughly 20 minute segments. So here now, for you, this Sunday 8th of September 2013, Chapter 5 of The Tyranny of God: How Life Evolved On Earth.

Last week, we listened to Chapter 3 on Genetics. We looked at how replicators like DNA work, so that we can understand how organisms like us may have grown and evolved from the original replicator. I took you through what DNA, Chromosomes, Cells and Genes are. We learnt that chemicals in our bodies make up a genetic code, like letters making up alphabets. They make up words and sentences that instruct our cells how to manufacture the proteins our body needs. We learnt how this code is passed on from parents to children through DNA molecules that make up genes through sexual and asexual reproduction. These genes provide descendants of organisms with physical -- and especially of interest to us humans -- behavioural traits. I concluded the chapter by saying that even though genes, in their physical form, do not last forever, the information they contain is passed on inside living organisms for millions of years. In a sense, therefore, genes have the potential to be immortal and live on forever.

The next thing we need to look into is how organisms including plants and animals evolve. So here now, for you, this Sunday 1st of September 2013, Chapter 4 of The Tyranny of God: Evolution By Natural Selection.

TRANSCRIPT

Hello, this is Marquez from Reasonism.Org and welcome to Reasonism Radio. Reasonism Radio is a podcast for free-thinkers, non-believers, Reasonists, atheists and religious believers alike. You can listen to our podcasts by subscribing on iTunes or by visiting our website at Reasonism.Org.

Currently, we are broadcasting the audiobook version of The Tyranny of God. Last week, we listened to Chapter 3 on Genetics. We looked at how replicators like DNA work, so that we can understand how organisms like us may have grown and evolved from the original replicator. I took you through what DNA, Chromosomes, Cells and Genes are. We learnt that chemicals in our bodies make up a genetic code, like letters making up alphabets. They make up words and sentences that instruct our cells how to manufacture the proteins our body needs. We learnt how this code is passed on from parents to children through DNA molecules that make up genes through sexual and asexual reproduction. These genes provide descendants of organisms with physical -- and especially of interest to us humans -- behavioural traits. I concluded the chapter by saying that even though genes, in their physical form, do not last forever, the information they contain is passed on inside living organisms for millions of years. In a sense, therefore, genes have the potential to be immortal and live on forever.

The next thing we need to look into is how organisms including plants and animals evolve. So here now, for you, this Sunday 1st of September 2013, Chapter 4 of The Tyranny of God: Evolution By Natural Selection.

Last week, we listened to Chapter 2 on The Origin of Life. We fast-forwarded from when the solar system formed to the beginning of life on Earth. We came to understand how life may have originated from the emergence of a single molecule. We looked at experiments that emulated early conditions of the Earth to bring about a molecule we call the replicator. We referred to it as the replicator because unlike most other molecules that formed before it, this molecule was able to replicate itself. We know replicators exist because we are made up of them. DNA molecules are replicators. From there, we now need to ask how replicators like DNA work to understand how organisms like us may have grown and evolved from such humble beginnings. So here now, for you, this Sunday 25th of August 2013, Chapter 3 of The Tyranny of God: Genetics.

TRANSCRIPT

Hello, this is Marquez from Reasonism.Org and welcome to Reasonism Radio. Reasonism Radio is a podcast for free-thinkers, non-believers, Reasonists, atheists and religious believers alike. You can listen to our podcasts by subscribing on iTunes or by visiting our website at Reasonism.Org.

Currently, we are broadcasting the audiobook version of The Tyranny of God. Last week, we listened to Chapter 2 on The Origin of Life. We fast-forwarded from when the solar system formed to the beginning of life on Earth. We came to understand how life may have originated from the emergence of a single molecule. We looked at experiments that emulated early conditions of the Earth to bring about a molecule we call the replicator. We referred to it as the replicator because unlike most other molecules that formed before it, this molecule was able to replicate itself. We know replicators exist because we are made up of them. DNA molecules are replicators.

From there, we now need to ask how replicators like DNA work to understand how organisms like us may have grown and evolved from such humble beginnings. So here now, for you, this Sunday 25th of August 2013, Chapter 3 of The Tyranny of God: Genetics.

Last week, we listened to Chapter 1 on Cosmology. Cosmology is the study of the origins and the eventual fate of the universe. We discussed the Big Bang Theory and how the universe began 14 billion years ago. From there, we discussed how matter collected into clouds, which condensed. Smaller structures formed and they began forming bigger structures. We looked at how galaxies may have formed and how, 530 million years after the Big Bang, our very own galaxy -- the Milky Way -- slowly came into existence. Our own star -- the Sun -- formed, along with everything else in our solar system, including our own planet, the Earth, and its moon. Now, in Chapter 2, we fast-forward from when the solar system formed to the beginning of life on Earth. So here now, for you, this Sunday 18th of August 2013, Chapter 2 of The Tyranny of God: The Origin of Life.

TRANSCRIPT

Hello, this is Marquez from Reasonism.Org and welcome to Reasonism Radio. Reasonism Radio is a podcast for free-thinkers, non-believers, Reasonists, atheists and religious believers alike. You can listen to our podcasts by subscribing on iTunes or by visiting our website at Reasonism.Org.

Currently, we are broadcasting the audiobook version of The Tyranny of God. Last week, we listened to Chapter 1 on Cosmology. Cosmology is the study of the origins and the eventual fate of the universe. We discussed the Big Bang Theory and how the universe began 14 billion years ago. From there, we discussed how matter collected into clouds, which condensed. Smaller structures formed and they began forming bigger structures. We looked at how galaxies may have formed and how, 530 million years after the Big Bang, our very own galaxy -- the Milky Way -- slowly came into existence. Our own star -- the Sun -- formed, along with everything else in our solar system, including our own planet, the Earth, and its moon.

Now, in Chapter 2, we fast-forward from when the solar system formed to the beginning of life on Earth. So here now, for you, this Sunday 18th of August 2013, Chapter 2 of The Tyranny of God: The Origin of Life.

In the Preface of The Tyranny of God, I explain that before we get into discussing religion, we need to know what our Natural History is. We must begin from the very start to establish that we are all working on the same page, so to speak. Chapter 1 of the book is titled Cosmology. Cosmology is the study of the origins and eventual fate of the universe. I begin Chapter 1 with the Big Bang, because this is how far back human knowledge goes. So here it is, for you, this Sunday 11th of August 2013, Chapter 1 of The Tyranny of God.

TRANSCRIPT

Hello, this is Marquez from Reasonism.Org and welcome to Reasonism Radio.
I finished recording the audiobook version of The Tyranny of God. The editing and production is complete, and the website is now ready to accommodate it. To celebrate the release of the audiobook, Reasonism Radio is broadcasting the entire audiobook, chapter by chapter, in a series of podcasts.

Each chapter will be available for a week, until the next podcast is released. Reasonism Radio is available on iTunes as a podcast and from our website at Reasonism.Org.

The Introduction and the Preface of the book is already available on our website: here I introduce myself, and the background as to how and why I felt this book was important and went through how the book is structured. If you have not yet heard the introduction and the preface to this audiobook, please head over to www.reasonism.org. In the Top Menu, hover over Publications, then click on The Tyranny of God. Click the round, red button to play the Introduction and the Preface of the book.

In the book’s preface I explain that before we get into discussing religion, we need to know what our Natural History is. We must begin from the very start to establish that we are all working on the same page, so to speak. Chapter 1 of the book is titled Cosmology. Cosmology is the study of the origins and eventual fate of the universe.

I begin Chapter 1 with the Big Bang, because this is how far back human knowledge goes. So here it is, for you, this Sunday 11th of August 2013, Chapter 1 of The Tyranny of God.

This is our very first Reasonism Podcast. Today, I want to share with you a conversation I recently had with a Baptist Pastor. He is visiting from the Philippines with a relative of mine, whom he was grooming to become his assistant. We had a chat about the general state of affairs here in Australia. I was telling them how Australia has been doing fine economically but how recently, the demand for Western Australia’s mining resources have begun to decline as a result of the reduced demand for China’s goods world-wide. Slowly then the conversation progressed to what he thought was going on in the world. Because he is a Pastor, I expected somewhat of a religious tinge to the way he would read current affairs. I did, however, not expect it to be as bizzare as it turned out to be.

Hello, this is Marquez from Reasonism.Org!

This is our very first Reasonism Radio / Podcast. Some people go to church on Sundays to relax and reflect on life in general. I turn on the television and I see a televangelist broadcasting a sermon to an impressive audience, reaching many people all over the world, telling people that Jesus loves them and ask for donations. What do non-believers and freethinkers do when they have some spare time on weekends or Sundays?

For a while now I’ve been thinking of creating a broadcasting channel to reach out to free-thinkers, non-believers, Reasonists and atheists alike. I considered recording videos however it would take too much time and therefore may not be sustainable in the long term. I decided to record podcasts instead, so here we are. Podcasts are a convenient way to broadcast the spoken word, because they are easy to listen to on your smartphones, iPods and mp3 players while in the car or going for a walk.
So let’s get straight to it, shall we?

Today, I want to share with you a conversation I recently had with a Baptist Pastor. He is visiting from the Philippines with a relative of mine, whom he was grooming to become his assistant. We had a chat about the general state of affairs here in Australia. I was telling them how Australia has been doing fine economically but how recently, the demand for Western Australia’s mining resources have begun to decline as a result of the reduced demand for China’s goods world-wide.

Slowly then the conversation progressed to what he thought was going on in the world. Because he is a Pastor, I expected somewhat of a religious tinge to the way he would read current affairs. I did, however, not expect it to be as bizzare as it turned out to be.

He gave indications that he believed there is a global push for a single currency, citing the Euro as an example, and this, in his mind, is a very bad thing. Then he went on to tell about an obscure photo of the Pope. If you were to zoom in this photo, he proclaimed, you can see the numbers 666, which he reminded me, is the number of the devil as stated in a Bible verse he cited.

I was listening. I was quiet. I was trying to follow the logic in his argument. He went on to further list a few dot points which he was slowly working to connect. He believed that these, and other current affairs, are all the doings of an anti-Christ ,who is working his powers in the world today. He did mention atheists as somewhat part of this plan.

In my head I was thinking: ‘Boy, this conversation just took a weird turn’. I sat there listening to get a wider view of his world perspective. I didn’t really know what to say or how to react. After a while, he noticed that I wasn’t inputting much into the conversation, just verbal nods of hms and ah-hah’s.

I don’t know how it happened but all of a sudden, I find myself being asked what I thought about his theory, seeing I have been quiet for most of the last 10 or so minutes. I was thinking, “Do I engage him in a debate? Is it rude to debate him about his beliefs? After all, he is my parent’s visitor and maybe this will not turn out well. But can I, or should I, really allow these ideas to go unchallenged?”

After the debate in my head came to an end, I finally spoke. I said, “I am not quite sure what to think or what to say. You are coming from a perspective that is quiet opposite to where I am coming from. And the gap is wide. I am still thinking about how I can bridge it”.

This statement made him hold back a bit on delivering any more of his fantastical ideas. Then he became curious about what my beliefs were. He asked me about my religion and I told him I was born Anglican and Catholic, because of my parents, but if I were to formally sign a document of my religion, I would put down “none”.
He became even more curious and proceeded to ask more questions which lead to a real passionate, but pleasant, discussion during and after dinner.

I explained to him how imprudent it is for a person to base his entire knowledge on the writings of one book, nodding to the Bible he had opened earlier to support his argument. For example, if it is true that there is a push towards a single global currency, then we can seek explanations for this from other perspectives. The problem with looking at everything from a Biblical perspective is that you see the world through tinged glasses, imbued by your indoctrination. I pointed out that working towards a single global currency is something I doubt will happen anytime within our lifetimes. There are economic benefits for a group of nations to tie their currencies into one, but there are also many arguments in favour of a nation having its own currency. Regardless of how these discussions are going, you can explain things like these by looking purely into economic and political pressures. You do not need to invoke the existence of an anti-Christ nor conspiracy theories to explain current affairs.

I will spare you the rest of our discussion however I would like to share the end that to me was the highlight of that night.
After what might have been 4 hours, it was probably already 10 at night, he said, “okay we better stop this discussion because your cousin might begin to have doubts about the Christian belief and that’s not good because I was rather hoping he would become my assistant”.

I laughed then turned to my cousin who was sitting and following the conversation for most of the time, and said, “Charlie (not his real name of course), if it is the truth you seek, then do not be afraid to know about and read about everything. If you want to know about the true nature of say, Hercules, you do not go and read just one book on the story of Hercules that tells you he was a god. Instead, you go and read about the history of the culture in which he belonged, and about the people who authored his story. You look at independent sources of information. That is how you get to the truth. The same is true with any religion. If you want to understand their true nature, it is not enough you read their holy books, you also need to look into their histories and other resources that are independent of them. The truth always wins, so do not be afraid to pit ideas against each other because that is the only way to find out what is true”.

With that, the night was drawing to an end and the Pastor wound up the conversation with a funny joke about an Atheist, a Buddhist and a Christian. Maybe I’ll share it with you next time. Overall, I found it a pleasant experience to engage a Pastor in a discussion where we could go all out, knowing we were just debating ideas. There was no one watching, apart from my mother and my cousin, so there were no egos on the line. We could focus on debating ideas instead of trying to save face.

This is what I wanted to share with you in this podcast. Please share with us any of your own interesting conversations you had with other people. Your story maybe chosen for publication on our website. I hope you tune in again next time. You can subscribe to our channels on iTunes, on our website at Reasonism.Org, or on YouTube to make sure you don’t miss any of the next podcasts. This is Marquez from Reasonism.Org. Thank you for listening.

According to Matthew 1:18-25, Mary became pregnant with Jesus while she was engaged (but still unmarried) to Joseph. After Joseph found out about the pregnancy, he wanted to break off the engagement. But then an angel came to him in a dream, told him about Jesus, and persuaded him to go through with the marriage. Did other members of his family initially disapprove of his activities?

According to Matthew 1:18-25, Mary became pregnant with Jesus while she was engaged (but still unmarried) to Joseph. After Joseph found out about the pregnancy, he wanted to break off the engagement. But then an angel came to him in a dream, told him about Jesus, and persuaded him to go through with the marriage.

Mary was still a virgin when she gave birth to Jesus, and he was her first child. But she apparently had some other children later. Evidence for this is found at Matthew 13:55-56 and Mark 6:3, which indicate that Jesus eventually had four brothers and at least two sisters. The names of his brothers are given as James, Joses, Simon, and Jude. Unfortunately, his sisters aren't named, and we don't even know how many there were.

Some Christians believe that Mary was a virgin throughout her life, and that Jesus was her only child. People who believe this argue that the brothers and sisters mentioned in the gospels must have been step-brothers and step-sisters. However, Luke 2:7 refers to Jesus as Mary's "first-born", thus implying that she had other children later. In fact, most biblical scholars believe that all of the mentioned children were sons and daughters of Mary who were born after Jesus.

Joseph was a carpenter, and he presumably taught this trade to Jesus. However, there is evidence that Joseph died prematurely. Apparently he didn't accompany Mary to the wedding at Cana, and he doesn't appear in any subsequent part of the story either. Also, according to John 19:27, after the crucifixion Mary went to live at the home of the un-named Beloved Disciple, which she probably wouldn't have done if her husband had still been alive.

When Jesus left home to begin his ministry, other members of his family appear to have disapproved. According to Mark 3:21, they said that he was "out of his mind", and some of them attempted to "take charge of him" and bring him home. Matthew 12:46-50 indicates that he refused to talk to his mother and brothers when they tracked him down and tried to see him. And John 7:5 says "even his own brothers did not believe in him."

The gospels don't say how long this rift with his family lasted. But there must have been a reconciliation at some point, because Acts 1:14 says that Mary and all four brothers later joined the Nazarenes, the original community of believers who lived in Jerusalem after Jesus departed.

According to Luke 1:36, Mary was a relative of Elizabeth, the mother of John the Baptist. Luke 1:39-56 says that Mary went to live at Elizabeth's home in Judea after she became pregnant with Jesus and stayed there for about three months. Some scholars have suggested that Mary used Elizabeth's home as a refuge while waiting for Joseph to decide whether to accept her as his wife.

The oldest brother of Jesus was named James. He became a very important leader in the early church, and is the named author of the New Testament Epistle of James. Because he was very pious, and followed the Jewish religious laws very strictly, he was called James the Just (or James the Righteous). He was condemned to death and executed in Jerusalem in 62 AD.

Another brother of Jesus, called Jude, is the named author of the New Testament Epistle of Jude.

According to the gospels, Mary became pregnant with Jesus through a divine action. Luke 1:26-35 says that the angel Gabriel visited her beforehand and told her that "the Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you." And Matthew 1:18 says "she was found to be with child through the Holy Spirit." Is there a natural explanation?

According to the gospels, Mary became pregnant with Jesus through a divine action. Luke 1:26-35 says that the angel Gabriel visited her beforehand and told her that "the Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you." And Matthew 1:18 says "she was found to be with child through the Holy Spirit."

When Mary became pregnant, she was engaged (but still unmarried) to Joseph. Matthew 1:19-24 says that Joseph wanted to back out of the marriage after he found out about the pregnancy. But then an angel appeared to him in a dream, told him about Jesus, and convinced him to accept Mary as his wife. Matthew 1:25 says that he "had no union with her until she gave birth to a son", thus confirming that it was a virgin birth.

Jewish girls of that period usually became engaged when they were twelve or thirteen years old. Actually, for legal purposes this engagement was regarded as the first stage of a marriage, although the girl would normally remain with her parents for about a year before going to live with her husband and consummating the marriage. If she became pregnant before then, she would face public disgrace, and if the law was strictly enforced, could even be executed as an adulteress.

Thus Joseph's initial intention to back out of the marriage could have put Mary into a very difficult situation. She may have even fled from her hometown for a while, because Luke 1:36-56 says that she spent three months of her pregnancy at the house of her relative Elizabeth in Judea. Some scholars have suggested that she made this visit to avoid the humiliation she would have experienced in her own community. In any case, Joseph's eventual decision to proceed with the marriage must have been a great relief.

According to Saint Augustine and some other early Christian writers, Mary didn't feel any labor pains when she gave birth to Jesus. These writers believed that labor pains are a curse that God put on women because of Eve's misbehavior in the Garden of Eden (see Genesis 3:16). But because Mary conceived Jesus in a divine manner, the curse didn't apply to her, and therefore the birth was painless.

Many Christians believe that Mary remained a virgin throughout her life. However, Matthew 13:55-56 and Mark 6:3 say that Jesus had four brothers and at least two sisters. Some people argue that these must have been step-brothers and step-sisters. But most biblical scholars believe that they were natural children of Mary and Joseph who were born after Jesus. Supporting evidence for this view can be found at Luke 2:7, which refers to Jesus as Mary's "first-born", thus implying that she had other children later.

The virgin birth isn't mentioned in the earliest Christian writings, such as the letters of Paul and the gospel of Mark. This has led some scholars to argue that the idea wasn't part of the original beliefs about Jesus, but was introduced later. One possible explanation is that Mary didn't tell anyone about it until she was near the end of her life, so the earliest followers of Jesus never heard about it.

Some ancient non-Christian writings give a completely different account of the birth of Jesus. These writings say that Mary was either seduced or raped, but that this was covered up. Some accounts even say that the real father of Jesus was a Roman soldier variously identified as Pantera, Pandera or Panthera. These non-Christian accounts are examined in detail by Dr. Jane D. Schaberg in her book The Illegitimacy of Jesus . Some of the evidence discussed in the book seems to support the idea that Mary was raped, but much more would be needed to provide a definite proof.

Stories about divine conceptions and virgin births were fairly common in ancient times. They were created for kings and other famous men as a way to give them a semi-divine status. Examples include the pharaohs of Egypt, Alexander the Great, and various Roman emperors. Some scholars think that the story of Jesus' virgin birth developed as an imitation of similar stories about other famous men.

Note: There is a theoretical possibility that a woman could conceive a child naturally while still a virgin. It could happen if an unfertilized egg began to multiply and develop into a fetus on its own. This would lead to a natural virgin birth. The scientific name for this process is parthenogenesis, and it has actually been observed in reptiles and fish. But a baby produced in this way will always be a female, because the egg wasn't fertilized. Therefore this couldn't be what happened In Mary's case.

Readers of the gospels are often puzzled by a short passage at Matthew 27:52-53, which comes just after the description of Jesus' death on the cross. The passage says that some dead holy people returned to life and came out of their tombs, then went into Jerusalem, where many inhabitants of the city saw them. Because the King James translation refers to these resurrected people as "saints", this event is sometimes called "the resurrection of the dead saints". How can we explain this mysterious passage in the Gospel of Matthew?

Readers of the gospels are often puzzled by a short passage at Matthew 27:52-53, which comes just after the description of Jesus' death on the cross. The passage reads as follows:

The tombs broke open and the bodies of many holy people who had died were raised to life. They came out of the tombs, and after Jesus' resurrection they went into the holy city and appeared to many people.

The passage says that some dead holy people returned to life and came out of their tombs, then went into Jerusalem, where many inhabitants of the city saw them. Because the King James translation refers to these resurrected people as "saints", this event is sometimes called "the resurrection of the dead saints".

Matthew 27:51 indicates that an earthquake occurred just as Jesus died, and that this earthquake was what opened the tombs of these saints. But although they returned to life immediately, they apparently didn't go into Jerusalem until at least two days later, or no earlier than the first Easter Sunday.

The resurrection of these dead bodies obviously wasn't an ordinary event. In fact it was clearly a divine action. God could have brought it about directly, or he could have simply created the conditions that finally gave rise to it. Some people have suggested that the final trigger was a supernatural power that emanated from Jesus as he died on the cross.

Scholars have looked for reports of this resurrection in other ancient writings, but no definite references to it have been found. However, some scholars do see a possible connection to ancient prophesies about a resurrection of dead saints expected to occur during the End Times. The prophesies say that all dead saints will return to life at that time so that they can take their place in a newly-created eternal Kingdom of God. It has been suggested that the resurrection described in Matthew's passage was a "preview" of this predicted end-times resurrection.

Note: The image shows an artist's depiction of the universal resurrection predicted to take place during the End Times.

Another possible explanation for Matthew's passage relates it to a story known as the "Harrowing of Hell". According to this story, which is mentioned in the Apostles' Creed, after Jesus died on the cross he descended to Hell and rescued the souls of all the ancient dead saints from their imprisonment there. After these rescued souls left Hell, they could have returned to their old bodies in the tombs and brought them back to life. But if this is what happened, it must have taken place very quickly, because Matthew says that the saints were resurrected almost immediately after Jesus died.

Who Were These Resurrected Saints?

All of these resurrected saints were apparently buried in the vicinity of Jerusalem. Nothing is said about any dead saints who were buried elsewhere. The passage also doesn't identify any of the resurrected saints by name, but some later Christian writers speculated about who they might be. The suggested possibilities included Adam and Eve, Abel, Abraham, Isaiah, and various other Old Testament figures. Because the earliest followers of Jesus still considered themselves to be Jews, they would have regarded these Old Testament figures as saints.

Matthew also doesn't say what these resurrected saints did after they were seen in Jerusalem. Modern readers often assume that they went back to their tombs and died again. Such a temporary resurrection could still serve as a preview of the general resurrection prophesied for the End Times. However, the passage doesn't say that they died again, so other possibilities should be considered. Of course they probably aren't still alive on the earth somewhere. Perhaps the most likely remaining possibility is that they eventually ascended to heaven.

Were These People Really Resurrected?

The other three gospels don't mention the resurrection of these saints. Partly for this reason, many biblical scholars doubt that it really happened. They argue that such an extraordinary event, if it really occurred, would provide strong evidence for the divinity of Jesus, and therefore the other gospel writers would have also described it.

Another reason for doubt is that these resurrected saints would have created a lot of excitement when they appeared in Jerusalem, and a historian like Josephus, who wrote a detailed account of the period, probably would have said something about it. But he doesn't mention it at all.

For these reasons, many scholars believe that Matthew's passage describes a legendary story rather than a real event. It might be similar to a modern "urban legend". Of course, this raises the question of how such a story could have originated.

According to one theory, the story originated in the days immediately after the resurrection of Jesus. This would have been a time of great excitement for his followers. They believed that he was the long-awaited Messiah, and that he had come to establish a new eternal Kingdom of God on the earth. Buoyed by their high expectations, they could have regarded his resurrection as a "signal" that this new kingdom was about to be created. They could have even been looking for signs that it was beginning to appear.

One such sign would be the resurrection of the ancient dead saints. Perhaps some of Jesus' followers thought they saw resurrected saints walking around in Jerusalem during this period. If so, the original reports of these sightings might have survived in the form of a legendary story. And this legendary story might be what is preserved in Matthew's passage.

Note: Under normal circumstances, a dead body will eventually decompose to the point that its individual features are no longer recognizable. But many early Christians believed that the body of a true holy person is incorruptible, so that it doesn't decay at all, but is miraculously preserved for its eventual resurrection. This explains how long-dead saints could return to life in their original bodies.

The crucifixion of Jesus took place at a site near Jerusalem called Golgotha. But exactly where was it located? Golgotha is the biblical name for the place where Jesus was crucified. It was probably a small hill just outside the walls of ancient Jerusalem. According to Christian tradition, it was within the area now occupied by the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. But some biblical scholars doubt that this is the correct location.

The crucifixion of Jesus took place at a site near Jerusalem called Golgotha. But exactly where was it located? Golgotha is the biblical name for the place where Jesus was crucified. It was probably a small hill just outside the walls of ancient Jerusalem. According to Christian tradition, it was within the area now occupied by the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. But some biblical scholars doubt that this is the correct location.

The name "Golgotha" is derived from the Aramaic word gulgulta . Matthew 27:33 and Mark 15:22 give its meaning as "place of the skull." When Saint Jerome translated these verses into Latin, he used the Latin word for skull, calvaria , which was later converted into the English word Calvary.

The gospels don't say why Golgotha was called the "place of the skull". One common suggestion is that the site was on a hill or near a rock that had the shape of a skull. Another suggestion, first made by the third-century scholar Origen, is that the name referred to the burial place of Adam's skull, traditionally believed to have been interred at Jerusalem. But these are just suggestions, and no one really knows how the site got its name.

The bible also doesn't say where Golgotha was located. But it does give three specific clues:

Clue 1. John 19:41-42 says that Jesus' body was carried only a short distance before it was placed in the tomb. This indicates that the site was probably near a cemetery.

Clue 2. Hebrews 13:12 says that the site was "outside the city gate", but unfortunately doesn't say which gate.

Clue 3. Matthew 27:39 indicates that the location was near a road which carried a lot of foot traffic.

The second clue is consistent with a traditional Jewish religious requirement that all executions had to take place outside the city, a requirement which the Romans appear to have generally honored. And the third clue is consistent with the fact that the Romans often crucified people on elevated spots near major roads, to serve as a warning of the probable fate of anyone who challenged their authority.

Some scholars have suggested that Golgotha was probably near the northern section of the city, because this would put it close to the administrative area, where the main public buildings were located. At the time of the crucifixion, the northern section of the city was bounded by the so-called Second Wall. Unfortunately Jerusalem was destroyed twice by the Roman army during Jewish revolts in the first and second centuries, and this makes it difficult to determine the exact boundaries of the ancient city. However, the approximate location of the Second Wall is known.

During the first destruction of Jerusalem, most Christians fled the city, and the second destruction dispersed almost the entire population. Because of these upheavals, and because Christian writers rarely mentioned Golgotha during the next two centuries, some scholars think that knowledge of its location was probably lost. But other scholars argue that local traditions could have been strong enough to preserve the knowledge despite the upheavals. The scarcity of reliable information from these early centuries makes it impossible to know for sure.

Better information is available in writings from the fourth century onward, starting from the time of Constantine the Great. During his reign he and his mother, Empress Helena, became interested in building a church near the locations of Golgotha and the tomb in which Jesus was placed. The idea was especially appealing to the Empress, and in 326 AD she made a trip to Jerusalem to explore the possibilities.

Note: The map shows the traditional site of Golgotha as identified by Empress Helena.

When the Empress reached Jerusalem, she was told that Golgotha and the tomb were in the vicinity of an old Jewish cemetery located on the northwest side of the city. The original source of this information is uncertain. One story, found in a fifth-century book called the Acts of Judas Cyriacus , says that Christians had learned about the cemetery from an old Jew who had to be tortured before he would reveal its location. But many scholars doubt this story, and in fact there is a good possibility that the cemetery was well-known to the people of the city. It's also possible that local traditions associated the cemetery with past crucifixions, thereby making it an obvious choice for the site of Golgotha.

In any case, the Empress was told that Golgotha and the tomb were in the vicinity of this old Jewish cemetery. But the exact locations of the two sites were still unknown. One problem was that the Romans had built a pagan temple over part of the cemetery, and in the process they probably destroyed parts of it.

Shortly after her arrival, the Empress ordered the demolition of the pagan temple and the excavation of the area beneath it. The earliest account of this excavation, by the church historian Eusebius, simply says "the venerable and hallowed monument of Our Lord's resurrection became visible." Exactly what this means isn't clear, but some later accounts say that the excavation uncovered a tomb containing some nails and the sign that Pilate had attached to the top of the cross. Several later accounts also say that three crosses were found, either in the tomb or a nearby cistern, and that one of them was identified by its healing powers as the true cross.

Because the earliest writer Eusebius doesn't mention the nails, the crosses, or Pilate's sign, some scholars think that the later accounts were embellished, especially since they differ from each other in various details. Thus, there is some uncertainty about what was actually found during the excavation.

The first churches built at the location were later destroyed, once by Persian invaders, and once by Arabs. After the Crusaders gained control of Jerusalem in the eleventh century, they constructed the present Church of the Holy Sepulchre, although part of it had to be rebuilt after it was damaged by a fire in 1808. It encloses both the tomb of Jesus and a small rocky outcrop called the "rock of Golgotha".

According to church tradition, Jesus began his walk to Calvary from the Antonia Fortress, which housed the main Roman military garrison in the city. The traditional route, called the Via Dolorosa, covers a distance of about 0.4 mile [650 meters] and ends at the church. However, some scholars think that the last interrogation of Jesus took place at Herod's Palace, and that he began the walk from there. This would be a shorter distance.

The site of the present church appears to fit the available evidence regarding Golgotha's location: The church is northwest of the ancient city, probably just outside the ancient wall, and apparently in the area of an old cemetery. Thus it may very well mark the correct location, or at least be near it. But some scholars have expressed doubts, and several other possible sites have been proposed. The best-known alternate location, Gordon's Calvary (the Garden Tomb), is about 0.4 mile north of the ancient city.

Was the original ending of this gospel accidentally lost? Was a new ending added later? Ancient copies of the Gospel of Mark can have several different endings. The shortest ending is found in the oldest manuscripts, all of which stop at verse 16:8. Most later manuscripts contain some additional verses, not always the same, which were apparently added to the gospel at later points in time. Excluding minor variations, these later additions created three new endings. The authors of these new endings didn't identify themselves.

Ancient copies of the Gospel of Mark can have several different endings. The shortest ending is found in the oldest manuscripts, all of which stop at verse 16:8. Most later manuscripts contain some additional verses, not always the same, which were apparently added to the gospel at later points in time. Excluding minor variations, these later additions created three new endings. The authors of these new endings didn't identify themselves.

Several theories have been put forward to explain the different endings:

Theory 1. The original ending (beyond verse 16:8) was accidentally lost. Later readers noticed the abrupt cutoff in the story, and several of them tried to finish it by inventing new endings.

Theory 2. The original ending was intentionally removed by cutting the manuscript at verse 16:8. Several later readers, unaware of what had happened, created new endings.

Theory 3. The original author was interrupted or died before he could finish the gospel, and had reached verse 16:8 at the time of the interruption.

Theory 4. The original author actually did intend to stop at verse 16:8, even though the story seems unfinished to most people.

The possible loss of the original ending is especially unfortunate because many biblical scholars consider Mark to be the earliest and most reliable gospel. It's also unfortunate that the apparent cutoff of the original text occurs at a critical point in the story, early on the first Easter Sunday just after Mary Magdalene and two other women discover that the tomb is empty. These women had just been told that Jesus was alive and on his way to Galilee, and that the disciples would see him there. But any account of what happened next, if it ever existed, is now lost.

One popular theory is that the original ending (beyond verse 16:8) was lost when part of a scroll accidentally broke off. In fact some scholars think that a portion of verse 16:8 itself is missing, with the extant text stopping in the middle of a sentence. If true, this would provide strong support for the theory of an accidental break off.

But there is another way to interpret verse 16:8 in which the final sentence does come to a proper end. If this interpretation is correct, it would mean that the cutoff occurred between sentences, which goes against the theory of an accidental severing of the manuscript. Another argument against the accidental-loss theory is that an ancient scroll was normally rolled up with the ending on the inside where it would be unlikely to break off.

Another theory is that someone intentionally destroyed the original ending because it was inconsistent with some basic Christian beliefs. Of course this is merely speculation, since there is no direct evidence to support such an idea. Also, if someone had decided to destroy the ending for this reason, he or she probably wouldn't have chosen verse 16:8 as the cutoff point, because that still leaves inconsistencies. For example, verse 16:7 indicates that the disciples will have to go to Galilee to see the risen Jesus, whereas the other gospels say that he was first seen in Jerusalem. And verse 16:8 says that the women didn't tell anyone about finding the tomb empty, but the other gospels say that they immediately went and told some of the male disciples.

If the original ending really was lost or destroyed, it probably happened within a few years after the gospel was written. Otherwise the authors of Matthew and Luke, who most likely used copies of Mark as a source, would have included versions of his original ending in their gospels. Also, a longer time period would have allowed many copies of the gospel to be made, and this would increase the chance that the original ending would survive.

Some scholars think that the author of Mark stopped at verse 16:8 on purpose, despite the abrupt cutoff in the story. This is certainly possible. But it would mean that the original version of the gospel didn't describe any post-resurrection appearances of Jesus.

Another possibility is that the author was interrupted or died before he could finish writing the gospel. However, if this had happened, other people would have probably known about it, and someone likely would have mentioned it in other early writings. Still, this possibility can't be ruled out, even though it is basically speculation.

The ending chosen for most modern bibles is known as the Longer Ending (or Apocryphal Addition). It consists of twelve additional verses (Mark 16:9-20) which are attached after verse 16:8. Because these twelve verses aren't in the oldest manuscripts, and are written in a different style, they almost certainly weren't part of the original gospel. But many people don't know this and therefore accept them as authentic.

In one of these added verses (Mark 16:18), the resurrected Jesus says that believers "will pick up snakes with their hands; and when they drink deadly poison, it will not hurt them at all." Although Jesus probably never said this, many Christians believe that he did, and a few congregations even include the handling of poisonous snakes in their church services.

The Secret Gospel of Mark

Some important new information about Mark's gospel may have been discovered in 1958 at the Mar Saba monastery near Jerusalem. The discovery is a possible copy of an ancient letter written by Clement of Alexandria, in which he quotes two passages from a previously unknown version of Mark. Although questions have been raised about the authenticity of this letter, most scholars believe that it is genuine.

According to the letter, this other version of Mark was called the "Secret Gospel of Mark", and only a small number of people had seen it. Because it contained extra passages, it was apparently a longer version of the gospel. In fact some scholars think that it was actually the original version. If so, the New Testament version could be a shortened form with some passages, including the ending, intentionally removed. Thus, if a complete text of the secret version could be found, it might reveal the true original ending.

But unless new information is uncovered, questions about the gospel's ending will remain unanswered. All of the main theories involve conjectures, and all of them have deficiencies. As a result, the uncertainty about the true ending is one of the biggest unsolved problems in biblical scholarship.

According to some estimates, early Christians wrote at least twenty gospels that weren't included in the bible. Many of these non-biblical gospels apparently disappeared later, although it's possible that copies of some of them still survive at unknown locations. Luckily, several that appeared to be missing have been found again in modern times. But some are still missing, and could be permanently lost.

According to some estimates, early Christians wrote at least twenty gospels that weren't included in the bible. Many of these non-biblical gospels apparently disappeared later, although it's possible that copies of some of them still survive at unknown locations. Luckily, several that appeared to be missing have been found again in modern times. But some are still missing, and could be permanently lost.

According to some estimates, early Christians wrote at least twenty gospels that weren't included in the bible. Many of these non-biblical gospels apparently disappeared later, although it's possible that copies of some of them still survive at unknown locations. Luckily, several that appeared to be missing have been found again in modern times. But some are still missing, and could be permanently lost.

Gospels that were left out of the Bible are called non-canonical gospels. Many scholars also call them apocryphal gospels, because most of them have unknown origins. This uncertainty about their origins was one reason many of them were excluded from the Bible. But some were also excluded because they expressed unorthodox or heretical views.

Scholars know about the past existence of some missing gospels because they are mentioned in other ancient writings that have survived. Parts of some lost gospels were even copied into surviving writings, so that a portion of their original content is still preserved.

In fact, people are often surprised to learn that parts of several lost gospels may have been preserved in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. This preserved material has been identified by certain characteristics which indicate that it was copied from other writings. Thus the authors of the New Testament gospels apparently got some of their information from earlier writings. Modern scholars call these earlier writings "sources", and have determined that there were probably three of them. But apparently all of them have disappeared.

These three lost sources may have been the first gospels. Their ancient names are unknown, so they are usually identified by modern names, specifically the Lost Q Source, the Pre-Markan Passion Narrative, and the Signs Gospel. Because no copies of any of them have survived, they are sometimes called hypothetical gospels. But most scholars believe that they really did exist at one time.

Actually, these three missing gospels aren't completely lost, since material from them is preserved in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. In fact, considerable knowledge about their original content has been obtained by studying this preserved material.

Some other non-biblical gospels have been discovered more directly, because actual physical remains have been found. Examples include the Gospel of Peter, the Gospel of Mary, and the Gospel of Judas. All of these were discovered in modern times. But only fragments or secondary translations have been found, so the complete original forms of all of them are still unavailable.

These three rediscovered gospels are named after Simon Peter, Mary Magdalene, and Judas Iscariot, but those weren't their real authors. Their real authors are unknown, and will probably never be identified. In ancient times anonymous authors would sometimes ascribe their books to famous people in an effort to get more publicity and authority for them.

Ancient writers mentioned a number of other gospels which they knew about, but which apparently no longer survive. These include the Gospel of Matthias, the Gospel of Perfection, the Gospel of the Seventy, the Dialogue of the Savior, the Gospel of the Twelve, the Gospel of the Hebrews, the Gospel of the Nazarenes, the Gospel of Bartholomew, the Secret Gospel of Mark, and the Gospel of Eve. Other gospels may have also existed, but even their names have been lost.

Some early gospels may have vanished because they were secret gospels and very few copies were made. Others could have been lost due to wars, conquests, upheavals, and persecutions. In addition, there have been accusations that early church leaders intentionally destroyed some gospels in order to cover up embarrassing facts about the origins of Christianity. Some intentional destruction did take place, but exactly what was lost can't be determined.

But the modern discoveries prove that a missing gospel can sometimes be found again. And there is a chance that more will be found in the future, especially since small fragments of several possible unknown gospels have been uncovered in various excavations.

Here are brief descriptions of some of the best-known lost (or rediscovered) gospels:

The Gospel of Mary

The existence of this gospel was unknown until several fragments were discovered in modern times. Since the only long fragment is a Coptic translation, most of the original Greek text is still lost. And even the long fragment may only include about half of the book.

Because the "Mary" in this gospel is depicted as a very prominent disciple, most scholars assume that she is Mary Magdalene, although in the extant text she is always just called Mary. The gospel emphasizes her prominence by presenting her as a strong leader, and by suggesting that she was the most favored disciple of Jesus and received a special revelation from him. It also suggests that this led to a conflict with Peter, who may have seen her as a threat to his position as overall leader of the disciples in the period after Jesus departed.

Indications of a rivalry with Peter are especially evident in the last section of the extant text, in which Mary gets into an argument with Peter and his brother Andrew over some private revelations that Jesus had given to her. This section may derive from memories of a historical conflict between her and Peter which eventually caused her to leave the group. Thus, although this gospel probably wasn't written until the second century, it may preserve some traditions passed down from an earlier period.

The Gospel of Mary contains some gnostic ideas, particularly in the section which describes the revelations she received from Jesus. This connection with gnosticism, together with the prominent role that the gospel gives to a female, may have led to its suppression by orthodox Christians.

The Gospel of Peter

A fragment of this gospel was discovered in Egypt in the late nineteenth century, and two more possible fragments have been found since then. But a large portion may still be missing. Hopefully the remainder will eventually be found, because the available text contains some interesting material, including the only known description of Jesus leaving the tomb after his resurrection.

Ever since the first fragment was discovered, this gospel has been controversial. A few scholars think that it preserves some of the beliefs and views of the earliest Christians. But most regard it as a secondary work containing a mixture of fanciful elements and material copied from the New Testament gospels.

One intriguing part of this gospel is its account of the exit of Jesus from the tomb. This exit takes place during the night as some Roman soldiers stand guard nearby. Suddenly the soldiers see two men (or angels) descend from heaven and enter the tomb. A short time later the men come back out with Jesus between them. At this point the men look so tall that their heads reach to the sky, and Jesus looks even taller. They are followed out of the tomb by a cross. Suddenly the soldiers hear a voice from heaven, and the cross answers it.

The description of this scene puzzles many people, since it appears to depict a wooden cross that can walk and talk. But some scholars think that the passage is actually describing a cross-like formation of resurrected saints who have returned to life along with Jesus and follow him out of the tomb. A few scholars also see connections between this account and a passage at Matthew 27:52-53, which describes a similar resurrection of dead saints.

The Gospel of Thomas

This gospel was probably first written in Greek, but the only surviving complete text is a Coptic translation discovered in Egypt in 1945. Its initial section indicates that it contains the "secret sayings" of Jesus, and the main text then gives 114 of these sayings. In most of the passages Jesus speaks as a teacher and his disciples make comments and ask questions.

Because the initial section of this gospel refers to "secret sayings", many scholars believe that it was a secret gospel, at least originally. This means that it was thought to contain secret knowledge, and that only certain individuals were allowed to read it. Several other secret gospels, or fragments of them, have also been discovered.

The Gospel of Thomas may preserve some authentic teachings of Jesus that aren't found in the bible. For this reason, many scholars regard it as the most important surviving non-canonical gospel.

The Gospel of Judas

The only extant copy of this gospel was found in Egypt, but the time and place of its discovery are uncertain, and there are indications that it passed through the Egyptian black market at one stage.

The existing copy is a Coptic text, probably a translation of a still-lost Greek original. Unfortunately the manuscript is damaged in many places, and some pages are missing, so that translation and interpretation are difficult. However, many scholars believe that it was a secret gospel used mostly by certain gnostic sects of Christians.

This gospel is notable in that it may depict Judas Iscariot as the most loyal disciple of Jesus, and an innocent martyr instead of an evil betrayer. But because of the damage to the manuscript, and the difficulties of interpretation, there is some uncertainty about this matter. In any case, this is one of the later gospels, probably not written until the second century, and most scholars doubt that it contains any authentic information about the real Judas Iscariot.

The Lost Q Source

This hypothetical gospel is also called the Lost Sayings Gospel and the Q Document. Like other hypothetical gospels, its probable existence has been inferred from studies of the New Testament gospels. In fact, it is thought to be the original source of many of the teachings of Jesus that are preserved in Matthew and Luke. The name "Q" comes from the German word "quelle", which means "source".

Most scholars believe that this gospel was primarily a collection of the sayings of Jesus, with little narrative material or biographical information. In the earliest period these sayings must have been preserved orally, but later someone apparently collected them and wrote them down. They may have been collected for the use of early Christian missionaries as an aid in spreading the new faith.

Scholars have put together possible reconstructions of this gospel by extracting material from Matthew and Luke, but some uncertainties are involved in exactly what should be included. There is a chance that some of the original parts of this gospel have been completely lost.

The Pre-Markan Passion Narrative

Scholars have deduced the probable existence of this hypothetical gospel from careful studies of the Gospel of Mark. These studies indicate that the author of Mark obtained some material from an earlier source. This source is now lost, but the evidence suggests that it was a short narrative of the arrest, interrogation, and crucifixion of Jesus. For this reason, it is called the Pre-Markan Passion Narrative (or Lost Passion Narrative).

The unknown author of this missing work had a good knowledge of what happened to Jesus during and after his arrest. It might have even been written by a member of the first community of believers, known as the Nazarenes, who lived in Jerusalem in the years after Jesus departed.

Reconstructions of the original form of this gospel indicate that it gave a simple straight-forward account of what happened before and during the crucifixion. Because this account may be the basis for all the later accounts, whoever wrote it performed an extremely important service.

The Lost Signs Gospel

The likely existence of this hypothetical gospel has been deduced from studies of the Gospel of John. It is called the Signs Gospel because it apparently described some miracles of Jesus which it called "signs". Its unknown author may have regarded the ability of Jesus to perform these miracles as one of the "signs" that he was the Messiah.

These miracles include the changing of water into wine (John 2:1-11), the giving of sight to the man born blind (John 9:1-8), the healing at the Pool of Bethesda (John 5:2-9) and the raising of Lazarus (John 11:1-45). The fact that these particular miracles aren't mentioned in the other gospels indicates that their authors probably hadn't seen the Signs Gospel.

In addition to the miracle stories, this gospel may have also contained some information about John the Baptist, and about the crucifixion and resurrection. But it probably didn't have much information about the teachings of Jesus.

After Jesus ascended to heaven, many of his followers stayed in Jerusalem and gathered into a closely-knit group that became known as the Nazarenes. According to Acts 1:13-16, the group initially had about 120 members, including Jesus' mother Mary and all of his brothers. The two main leaders were Simon Peter and the oldest brother of Jesus, who was called James the Just. During an early meeting a man named Matthias was chosen to replace the traitor Judas Iscariot in the inner circle of the twelve primary disciples.

After Jesus ascended to heaven, many of his followers stayed in Jerusalem and gathered into a closely-knit group that became known as the Nazarenes. According to Acts 1:13-16, the group initially had about 120 members, including Jesus' mother Mary and all of his brothers. The two main leaders were Simon Peter and the oldest brother of Jesus, who was called James the Just. During an early meeting a man named Matthias was chosen to replace the traitor Judas Iscariot in the inner circle of the twelve primary disciples.

The Nazarenes were the original core group from which Christianity grew and spread. But initially they still considered themselves to be Jews. They prayed in the temple at Jerusalem, and they followed most of the traditional Jewish religious practices. Other people in the city regarded them as a new Jewish sect.

But the Nazarenes differed from other Jewish sects in a fundamental way, for they believed that Jesus was the Messiah. They boldly took this message into the streets of Jerusalem and soon began to attract many new converts. They also spread the message to friends and relatives who lived in other places, and within a few years small groups of believers were established in several other cities.

At first most of the new converts were other Jews, many of whom were already interested in the prophesies about the Messiah. But then the apostle Paul began to convert many non-Jews (Gentiles). This led to a controversy when some Nazarenes from Jerusalem visited a community of new believers in Antioch and told some Gentile converts there that they would have to be circumcised in order to be saved. Paul strongly disagreed with this, and he made a special trip to Jerusalem to try to resolve the issue.

When he reached Jerusalem, a meeting was held to discuss the matter. Although some of the Nazarenes argued against Paul, Peter apparently took his side. After a lengthy debate, the final decision was that Gentile converts didn't have to be circumcised, but would still have to obey the Jewish laws relating to idolatry, sexual morality, and diet. This important meeting, sometimes called the Council of Jerusalem, is described in Acts 15:1-29.

During these early years the converts in other cities regarded the Nazarenes in Jerusalem as the final authority for deciding important issues. This was mainly due to the presence of Peter, James the Just, and other original believers. They were granted a special status because they had known Jesus personally.

But Peter eventually left Jerusalem. And mostly because of Paul's activities, the number of converts in other cities grew rapidly. For these reasons, the Nazarenes began to lose their influence. As the years passed, their continued adherence to the old Jewish religious practices left them increasingly out of touch with newer believers, many of whom came from outside Judaism.

In 66 AD a fierce war broke out in Palestine between the Roman army and a group of Jewish rebels. The casualties were enormous, especially among civilians, but most of the Nazarenes were able to save themselves by abandoning their homes and fleeing from Jerusalem. According to the church historian Eusebius, many of them fled to a place called Pella east of the Jordan River. But although most of them escaped, they had suffered a terrible blow.

By then Christianity had begun to separate from Judaism, and the Nazarenes quickly lost any remaining influence they might have had. There is evidence that many of them never accepted Paul as a true apostle and didn't approve of some of the practices in the churches he established. Perhaps partly for this reason, they gradually became isolated from the main Christian movement, and had little effect on the subsequent history of the church.

The Nazarene Way of Life

During their years in Jerusalem, the Nazarenes sometimes called themselves followers of "The Way". By this, they apparently meant their way of life. According to Acts 4:32-33:

All the believers were one in heart and mind. No one claimed that any of his possessions was his own, but they shared everything that they had.

In addition to their insistence on sharing, the Nazarenes put a high value on devoutness, non-violence, and a very simple lifestyle. All of these ideas could have come directly from the teachings of Jesus. Many scholars have pointed out that the Nazarenes' lifestyle was similar to that of the Essenes. But theories about possible connections between the two groups are difficult to prove.

The origin of the name "Nazarenes" is uncertain. Because Jesus himself was sometimes called "the Nazarene", one frequent suggestion is that the name was derived from "Nazareth". But this can't be proven, and there are reasons to doubt it. Some of the uncertainty stems from the fact that ancient writers spelled the name in several different ways, including "Nazirenes", "Nazaraeans", and "Nazoreans".

Persecution of the Nazarenes

Even in the early days, when the Nazarenes were still a small group, they were already being persecuted by the local Jerusalem authorities. The stoning of Stephen, the first Christian martyr, is starkly described in Acts 7:54-60. The threat of further executions caused others in the group to temporarily go into hiding. It was during this period that Paul (then known as Saul) got involved in the persecutions, although it isn't clear how big a role he played.

Later, during another flareup of persecution, James the son of Zebedee was put to death with a sword. Peter would have probably also been executed, but an angel came during the night and helped him escape from jail. Apparently he avoided further trouble until his later years, but finally, according to church tradition, was killed in Rome. James the Just also managed to survive the early persecutions, but was eventually killed in 62 AD.

The Fate of the Nazarenes

After they fled from Jerusalem, the Nazarenes gradually became isolated from the main Christian movement. Despite this isolation, they still managed to survive for several centuries as an independent sect. Their survival was mentioned by several later writers, including Saint Jerome, who reported that he visited a community of them in the Syrian desert in about 380 AD.

Many scholars think that another group of them survived under the name Ebionites. These Ebionites recognized Jesus as the Messiah but considered him to be of normal human parentage. They adhered to the old Jewish laws, had their own gospel, and disapproved of the teachings of Paul. For these reasons, the fourth-century Bishop Epiphanius declared them to be heretics.

There aren't any reliable reports of what finally happened to either the Nazarenes or the Ebionites. Quite possibly both groups completely died out soon after the fourth century. However, a few scholars think that small communities may have survived for a longer period in remote areas. There has also been speculation that some late survivors were progenitors of medieval heretical groups such as the Cathars. But unless new information is uncovered, the final fate of the Nazarenes will remain a mystery.

Note: According to legend, a modern group of Christians known as the Nazarenes of Malabar (India) was founded by the disciple Thomas in 52 AD, and thus could be an offshoot of the original Nazarenes of Jerusalem. Another modern group, the Nazarenes of Mount Carmel, claims to be a "modern resurrection" of the ancient Nazarenes.

Can people be possessed by demons? In ancient times many people believed that evil spirits can enter a person's body and take control of it. This was a common explanation for conditions such as epilepsy and madness. In modern terminology this "madness" probably referred to certain mental disorders such as schizophrenia and delirium. Even today, we still don't fully understand what causes these conditions. Ancient people, who had even less understanding, frequently put the blame on evil spirits.

In ancient times many people believed that evil spirits can enter a person's body and take control of it. This was a common explanation for conditions such as epilepsy and madness. In modern terminology this "madness" probably referred to certain mental disorders such as schizophrenia and delirium. Even today, we still don't fully understand what causes these conditions. Ancient people, who had even less understanding, frequently put the blame on evil spirits. But are these evil spirits true?

These evil spirits were also called demons, devils, and unclean spirits. Anyone who came under their control was called a demoniac (or daimoniac), and the condition was known as "demonic possession".

In some ways demonic possession resembles multiple personality disorder. In this comparison, the demon acts like an evil alternate personality that has taken control of the mind. One difference is that an alternate personality usually doesn't take permanent control. But even when it isn't in control, it could still be lurking within the person's subconscious, and still might be able to influence behavior. Some people use this idea to try to blame their bad actions on an "inner demon".

The traditional cure for demonic possession is to expel the evil spirit from the victim's body. In ancient times this was known as driving out (or casting out) the demon. Many people now call it exorcism, and use the name exorcist for anyone who can successfully do it.

According to the gospels, Jesus often performed exorcisms along with his other miraculous healings. For instance, in describing his ministry in Galilee, Matthew 8:16 says:

When evening came, many who were demon-possessed were brought to him, and he drove out the spirits with a word and healed all the sick.

Sometimes a demon would try to talk to Jesus before it was expelled. For example, Mark 1:23-26 says that he was teaching to a some people in a synagogue when a possessed man suddenly cried out:

"What do you want with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are -- the Holy One of God." "Be quiet!" Jesus said sternly. "Come out of him!" The evil spirit shook the man violently and came out of him with a shriek.

In this passage the voice of the man is actually the voice of the demon inside him controlling his breath and vocal chords. And because this demon is a spirit, it is able to recognize Jesus as "the Holy One of God." But Jesus tells it to "Be quiet" about this. At this stage of his ministry he was trying to keep his messiahship secret, and he didn't want the demon to reveal it publicly.

The demon also asks Jesus if he has come to "destroy us." When it says "us", it is referring to itself and all the other demons in the world. It is afraid that Jesus has come to destroy all of them. This idea is mentioned several times in the gospel of Mark, which depicts Jesus as waging a kind of war against demons. But since demons were regarded as agents of the Devil, this was actually a war between Jesus and Satan.

Modern Possessions

According to witnesses of modern exorcisms, the demon sometimes tries to hide within the victim, and hours may pass before it finally reveals itself. Then a prolonged struggle will often take place, with the victim shaking and jerking violently as the demon fights the spiritual powers invoked to expel it. During one reported struggle of this type, the victim's face suddenly contorted into an evil sneer that apparently emanated from the demon itself. Then a terrifying shriek pierced the air, and the body collapsed on the floor as the demon left it.

Some attempted exorcisms have had tragic endings. In these cases victims were tied down, then repeatedly choked, squeezed, beaten, and starved, sometimes over a period of several days, and this eventually caused them to die. Although these deaths were probably unintentional, several exorcists have been convicted of crimes and sent to prison.

Jesus never used physical force when he performed an exorcism. He simply ordered the demon to leave the body. They always obeyed him because they knew who he was, and recognized his power and authority.

Although most cases of possession involve a single evil spirit, it's possible for a person to be taken over by several spirits simultaneously. For example, Luke 8:2 says that seven demons were expelled from Mary Magdalene. In a modern case, a victim spoke in different voices which claimed to be the same demons that had previously possessed Judas Iscariot, Emperor Nero, Adolf Hitler, and several other well-known evildoers.

John 7:20 and 8:52 say that some people in Jerusalem even accused Jesus himself of being possessed by a demon. This may have been their explanation for his ability to perform miraculous cures. At that time there was a general belief that a possessed person could have unusual qualities such as superhuman strength, ability to see the future, or other special powers.

Unfortunately, Christians have sometimes accused other Christians of being possessed. This has happened during religious wars and persecutions, and during investigations into heresy and witchcraft. At the trial of Joan of Arc, church officials said that the voices in her head came from demons. In modern times accusations of demon possession have been made against members of certain fringe sects and against people who speak in tongues.

Evil spirits are sometimes blamed for other problems besides epilepsy and madness. For example, some people say that alcoholics, homosexuals, drug addicts, sexual predators, and adulterers are possessed by demons. Some Christians believe that a person who is filled with the Holy Spirit will be protected from the demons that cause these types of problems.

According to some ancient writings, demons were originally angels in heaven who supported the Devil in his rebellion against God, and were thrown out of heaven with him. Some sources say that one-third of the angels were thrown out in this way, and this has led to estimates that thousands, or even millions, of demons now serve Satan here on the earth.

But many people doubt that demons really exist. In their view, the possessed individuals described in the gospels were simply people who had mental illnesses. And Jesus cured them either through miracles or by using psychological techniques such as hypnosis.

What was the real reason he was put on the cross? According to the gospels, the main charge against Jesus was that he claimed to be the king of the Jews. The Roman soldiers were mocking this idea when they dressed him in a purple robe and pressed a crown of thorns onto his head. This was also the charge written on the sign at the top of the cross.

According to the gospels, the main charge against Jesus was that he claimed to be the king of the Jews. The Roman soldiers were mocking this idea when they dressed him in a purple robe and pressed a crown of thorns onto his head. This was also the charge written on the sign at the top of the cross.

But the charge was false. The enemies of Jesus had concocted it by twisting the meaning of the old Jewish prophesies about the coming of the Messiah.

According to those prophesies, the Messiah was a great future leader who would appear during a period of extreme desperation and crisis known as the End Times (or Last Days). Assisted by God, he would overthrow all evil oppressors and set up a perfect kingdom on earth, where all the righteous people could live forever in peace and joy.

During the years when Jesus was growing up, many people believed that the End Times had already arrived, and that the Messiah would soon appear. This belief was especially strong in Galilee, the region of Palestine where Jesus lived. And the belief grew even stronger when John the Baptist began proclaiming that all the prophesies about the Messiah would soon be fulfilled.

But those prophesies could be interpreted in different ways. Some scriptures, such as Isaiah 53, depict the Messiah as a devout non-violent person who will prepare the way for the new kingdom by sacrificing himself to pay for humankind's sins. Other scriptures describe him as a future descendent of King David, and depict the new kingdom as a purified version of David's original kingdom. These references to King David caused many common people to envision the Messiah mainly as a military leader, whose first action would be to organize a revolt against the hated Romans and drive them out of the country.

The Romans were fully aware of the discontent in the country and the hope for a liberator. More riots and uprisings took place in Palestine than in any other part of their empire. Because of the continual unrest, they were always on the lookout for potential rebel leaders.

When Jesus began his ministry, he didn't publicly call himself the Messiah. He probably realized that it would be dangerous to do so, because even though he clearly didn't plan any type of military action, the authorities could have misunderstood his intentions and arrested him anyway. An example of his cautiousness can be found at Matthew 16:20, which says that "he warned his disciples not to tell anyone that he was the Christ." (The word Christ is the English equivalent of the Aramaic word for Messiah.)

But despite his public silence about this, his teachings and miraculous cures soon began to attract large crowds, and within a short time many people in Galilee were thinking that he might be the Messiah. As a result, when he and his disciples set out for Jerusalem to attend the annual Passover festival, they were accompanied on the trip by a large group of followers. It isn't clear how big this procession eventually became, because other groups of festival-goers may have joined it along the way. But by the time it reached Jericho it was large enough to attract considerable attention, for many people in the city heard that it was coming and gathered along the road to watch Jesus go by.

According to Luke 19:11, during the last stage of the trip many of the travelers were expecting the new perfect Kingdom of God to be created at any moment. This is an indication of the high level of excitement within the group at this time. This excitement was sustained all the way to the end of the trip, so that when Jesus reached Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, a large exuberant crowd celebrated his entry into the city.

Shortly after he arrived, he got so angry at the dishonest merchants in the temple courtyard that he launched a physical attack against them. A few biblical scholars, looking for hidden meanings, have argued that he was actually trying to trigger an uprising in the city. Others have suggested that he expected God to step in and create the new kingdom by divine intervention. But the gospels indicate that his main concern during this period was to prepare his disciples for his coming departure.

Christians often blame the Jews for his death. But this blame should probably be limited to the Jewish religious leaders, who had managed to keep some of their power by cooperating with the Romans. These leaders saw the crowds that gathered around Jesus, and they knew that many people were calling him the Messiah. Mark 11:18 says "they feared him, because the whole crowd was amazed at his teaching." But their ultimate fear probably went deeper, because if growing numbers of people believed that Jesus was the Messiah, he could eventually become a serious threat to their authority.

Mark 12:12 says that these religious leaders initially hesitated to arrest Jesus because "they were afraid of the crowd." But at some point they decided that they had to get rid of him. With Judas Iscariot's help, they were able to seize him late at night when there was no crowd to defend him. After interrogating him until early morning, they turned him over to the Romans and accused him of claiming to be a king.

Under Roman law, anyone who claimed to be a king was guilty of rebellion against the emperor. The normal punishment was crucifixion.

But the crucifixion couldn't take place until the Roman governor Pontius Pilate gave the final order for it, and the gospels indicate that he was reluctant to do so. Apparently he realized that Jesus was innocent. Actually, he had the power to release Jesus if he really wanted to. But in his role as governor he often needed the collaboration of the Jewish leaders. And in the end, he was more concerned with placating them than with saving Jesus.

Thus the gospels put nearly all of the blame for the crucifixion on the Jewish leaders. But some scholars think that just as much blame, or even more, should be placed on the Romans. In fact John 18:3 says that Roman soldiers took part in the initial arrest of Jesus, suggesting that the Romans were involved in the matter almost from the beginning. Their military commanders always kept a close watch on the city, especially during festivals. They could have easily mistaken Jesus for a political agitator, or even a potential rebel leader. And they were usually quick to react to even a minor threat.

When the Jewish leaders wanted to kill someone, they usually sent their henchmen to gather a mob and stone the victim to death. Crucifixion was a Roman method of punishment, and it is a basic fact that Roman soldiers, not Jews, put Jesus on the cross.

For these reasons, some scholars think that the Romans were the real culprits, but that the gospel writers tried to cover this up and blame the Jewish leaders instead. The gospels were written during a period when Christians were trying to avoid trouble with the Romans, and putting the blame on them could have created friction. It would have been much safer to blame the Jews.

But other scholars, while they agree that the Romans were partly responsible, still think that the Jewish leaders should get most of the blame. These leaders probably had a much greater fear of Jesus than the Romans did. But they wouldn't have wanted the common people to blame them for his death. To try to avoid this, they could have coaxed the Romans into believing that Jesus was a trouble-maker, and let them get rid of him.

A compromise view is that both groups, Jewish leaders and Romans, played major roles. But unless new evidence is uncovered, there will probably always be disagreement about who should get the most blame.

In any case, the crucifixion can be explained as a natural result of the prevailing political circumstances in Palestine. However, many Christians believe that it was actually pre-ordained beforehand, as part of a divine plan in which Jesus had to suffer and die as a sacrifice to pay for everyone's sins.

jesus christ

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]]>The Gospel MysteriesSat, 01 Oct 2011 01:05:00 +1000A Christian Pastor About To Be Killed In Iran For Not Converting To Islamhttp://reasonism.org/main-content/the-negative-effects-of-religion/item/2663-a-christian-pastor-about-to-be-killed-in-iran-for-not-converting-to-islam
http://reasonism.org/main-content/the-negative-effects-of-religion/item/2663-a-christian-pastor-about-to-be-killed-in-iran-for-not-converting-to-islam

Pastor Youcef Nararkhani is a Christian Pastor awaiting execution in Iran. His apparent crime: Apostasy. He has an Islamic ancestry therefore, he must remain a Muslim. He was asked to recant his faith in Jesus Christ or die. He has been given opportunities to recant his faith and he refused.

Religions are supposed to be for the well-being of human beings, are they not? If the christian god and the muslim god are supposedly the same, do we suppose that that same god approve of this?

The discussion seems pretty petty doesn't it? If you strip away the fancy religious words like apostasy, recant and faith, we can boil this situation to it's basics, it pretty much goes like this:

A: Stop believing in Jesus, believe in what we believe.

B: No thanks. I like what I believe

A: We give you three chances to say yes

B: No. No. No.

A: Okay then, we kill you

How tragic. This to me, is yet again an example of the attrocities people inflict on each other because of their beliefs in their gods.

In this video, Hans Rosling debunks old but persistent notions of 'developed world' and 'third world countries'. He also encourages better use of the information that is already available so we can better provide for our communities..

Every one of these readers will have different needs and reasons for wanting to read this book.

The Irreligious And The Atheists

This book can be a handy tool if you need help in clarifying why you may lack belief in God. I hope it helps you argue some of the ideas you have with other people.

The Agnostics

I was an agnostic once. As I found out, much of my agnosticism stemmed from my inability or unwillingness to seek the answers to the big questions of life and our existence. I went to an Episcopalian primary school and I went to a public school in high school. Neither of them taught the theory of evolution, natural selection or how life began.

Science is now at the stage where it is able to provide us all with intellectually-satisfying answers to many of our cosmological questions. Yet, sadly, millions of people remain ignorant of its ability to give us all a sense of wonder and appreciation for the beauty and drama of the world we live in.|

The Moderately Religious

I understand that many of you may have doubts about the existence of God. Perhaps you even doubt that religions come from divine sources, however, you still believe that religions could be beneficial in some way. I think many of you will find the scientific explanation behind the origins of life and evolution pleasantly surprising. To many of you, who have not really read your Scriptures, you might be interested to have another look at some of the verses and re-examine what it means to be moderately religious.

Regardless of your religion, I want to appeal to you because I am sure we share the same belief that extremism and the literal interpretation of the scriptures are not conducive to the type of society we want to live in.

The Strongly Religious

Strongly religious people usually get angry, offended, annoyed or dismissive of anybody, or anything, that challenges their beliefs. Sometimes they are even fearful of entertaining any idea that deviates from their beliefs because God might be watching. This book is not to make you doubt your beliefs; rather, to help you understand how people can not be religious like you.

I hope you will finish reading this book. I want to appeal to you by saying that, because we share the same planet, what you choose to believe in, affects everybody else. Likewise, what another person believes, will ultimately affect you. It is therefore very important to continue engaging in dialogue because that is the only way for humanity to overcome its challenges.

The Subject-Matter Experts

I have made every effort to find the latest and most robust theories and ideas to cover in this book. However, I am also aware that ideas are continuously being challenged by other ideas. Such is the reality of our search for truth. But so long as we ground our knowledge and wisdom with reality, we will eventually discover the answers we are looking for.

In writing this book, I largely wrote to communicate with people who have not formally studied your field... people like me. It is difficult to be an expert in all the subjects religion touches. This is why I have resorted to quoting many of you instead of using my own words. I hope I can arouse enough interest for people to learn more about your works, your theories and your ideas.

I welcome any feedback, corrections and invitations for further discussions, should you allow me the privilege. In this book, I have made some observations and postulations of my own. If you have any thoughts, experiments or works that either support or disagree with them, I would be delighted to hear about them.

I sought to tell the story of humanity from the beginning to the present. I structured this book so you can read it like a story book, where the earlier chapters are the foundations of later chapters. The following is a quick preview of what we will be discussing.

One of my biggest worries in writing this book was the breadth of topics I had to cover. At times, I wondered whether I was doing the right thing in casting as wide a net as I did. I chose to proceed because, to understand the true nature of religion, we cannot limit our discussions to religious texts. Instead, we need to take a larger, macroscopic view. We need to see how it relates to human nature and to our society. We need to consult our sciences and corroborate our analysis with our history.

In our struggle to broaden our outlook, we need to start from the very beginning. From there, we work progressively. We will learn about cosmology, abiogenesis, genetics, evolution, language, memes, history, current affairs and so on.

The main purpose of this book is not to argue against religion. Rather, it tells our story and how we have come to oppress ourselves with the tyranny of our own beliefs. I wrote this book to include everything I discovered to be relevant in my search for the truth, not just the truth behind God and morality, but also behind us and our existence. Instead of reading this book with the expectation that it is trying to prove the tyranny of God, I would like to recommend you read it as a story book: as a book that tells the story of humanity from the Big Bang.

I wanted to make this book easy to read and simple to understand, to the extent that I can in explaining some complex ideas. I also wanted it, regardless of the extensive amount of information, light enough to carry around whilst keeping important information intact.

Please be aware that in some cases, I had to choose among competing scientific theories. I chose to present the ones I found most convincing. Please use this book as a guide to direct you towards other knowledgeable and often beautiful works written by philosophers, scientists and other experts. The bibliography, therefore, will be valuable to you in expanding your search for knowledge. As science advances, and as I find better ways of expressing my arguments, it is likely I will update this book in the future.

We live our lives by creating a model of how everything in the universe fits. We create these models consciously or unconsciously. These models are important to help us understand who and what we are; what to do and where to go. Like maps that help us navigate streets, these models help us chart our course through life. With the dominance of religion in our lives, most of us end up with religious maps. When I refused to look at my map, I felt lost.

If there is no God, then how could we account for all the variety of life on this planet? If we evolved from ape-like creatures, and they evolved from something else, then how did life begin on Earth? If life on Earth began on a different planet, how did it start there? If our universe originated from a big explosion called the 'Big Bang', what was there before the Big Bang?

For most of our lives, religion has answered many of these questions for us. It is difficult, therefore, to remove or defuse religious dogmas because they are ingrained into the foundations of the models that you and I have created and adopted for ourselves.

If I were to take out the belief that there is no God from my mind, I also needed to extract everything else that necessitated His existence. When I did, I began to notice gaps in my mind and this resulted in my discomfort. With so many gaps, many of the questions I had previously answered were devoid of answers. And I desperately needed answers.

I no longer felt I could live the best possible life I could if I no longer knew the standard on which to base it. The only way was to fill these newly-created gaps in my mind, with new ideas, new knowledge and new ways of thinking.

I prepared to dedicate most of the thirty-first year of my life to read and research as much as I could. I wanted a new understanding of life, us, morality and God. This book is the result of that pursuit.

]]>marquez@reasonism.org (Marquez)The Tyranny Of GodFri, 05 Aug 2011 21:14:57 +1000Call for bishop's resignation amid new abuse allegationshttp://reasonism.org/main-content/item/2639-call-for-bishops-resignation-amid-new-abuse-allegations
http://reasonism.org/main-content/item/2639-call-for-bishops-resignation-amid-new-abuse-allegationsThe Catholic Church in Australia faces fresh criticism tonight over its handling of child sex abuse cases, this time from Ireland, the country seen as possibly the worst case in the Church's worldwide scandal. (Source)

sex abuse

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]]>marquez@reasonism.org (Marquez)BlogThu, 15 Jul 2010 09:29:40 +1000Monkeys catapult to freedom over fencehttp://reasonism.org/main-content/item/2638-monkeys-catapult-to-freedom-over-fence
http://reasonism.org/main-content/item/2638-monkeys-catapult-to-freedom-over-fence"A group of 15 monkeys at Kyoto University's primate research institute in Aichi Prefecture escaped from their forest home, which is encased by a five-metre-high electric fence. The monkeys made their break for freedom by bending and releasing tree branches to fling themselves over the fence." (Source)]]>marquez@reasonism.org (Marquez)BlogFri, 09 Jul 2010 10:25:20 +1000Film Review: Creation (Charles Darwin)http://reasonism.org/main-content/item/2637-film-review-creation-charles-darwin
http://reasonism.org/main-content/item/2637-film-review-creation-charles-darwin

I was fortunate enough to be given a preview of the new film titled 'Creation' with Jennifer Connelly and if you want to watch it and don't want to read my thoughts on it until after you do, then stop reading now. Otherwise, read on....

My observations/thoughts on the film:

I expected the focus to be more on his revolutionary ideas and how they contrasted with the common beliefs at the time. This film focussed more on Darwin's personal life, emotional and mental struggles from coping with his daughter's death and his wife's strong religious beliefs.

Much of the scenes assume that we know for certain what was happening in Charles Darwin's household.

The film assumed that Darwin talks, sees and hears his dead daughter (I understand that this might have been done as a form of symbolism, as a tool for storytelling however since the wife in the film confirmed it, it was more than just symbolism.)

The film says that Darwin lost faith in god after his daughter died.

The above two points paints the picture that Darwin was mentally unbalanced and bitter and may lead some viewers to a conclusion that perhaps his theories were motivated less by the search for truth than it is by bitterness or delusion.

I would love to read more about what we actually have as facts about Darwin's life and contrast it to the ideas explored by this film.

Darwin's wife reading his works and says, "may God forgive us", or something like that.

After the film, there's a line that says Christians awarded something to Darwin after his death.

The Title is 'Creation'.

All of the points above make me suspect that the creators of the film has a religious bias. It is as if, after the last two Pope's open admittance to that evolution is fact, this is now the religious' way to reconcile their conflicting beliefs to the fact of evolution. To me, this film seems to be trying to say that: "Evolution is still God's way of doing things". Is this a statement that was consciously crafted by the makers and financiers of this film? Or is it just my interpretation?

I might revise this review once I have researched more on the facts that we have on Darwin: from his letters and his works.

In terms of script, acting and so on, this film is okay but is no more or less spectacular than other well-crafted films highlighting the emotional and mental struggles of any man dealing with grief and coming to realise what love means.

In a way though, this film may serve to introduce Darwin to the very religious and perhaps gives the assurance that Darwin was not some sort of a devil but rather, an ordinary man. This hopefully encourages religious people to open books on evolution and actually learn to understand it.

Overall, however, given that Darwin's theories were revolutionary, this film could have been more. At a time when the existence of God is being hotly debated, the film had the potential to contribute by perhaps exploring Charles Darwin, Natural Selection and Evolution from a much broader perspective. Because of these expectations, I was disappointed. There is definitely a market for another film on Darwin.

My Rating on 'Creation':

1/10 - If you're hoping that it will add something new to the current discourse on faith vs reason.

David Makoeya, a 61-year-old man from the small village of Makweya, Limpopo province wanted to watch the World Cup. The rest of his family wanted to watch a religious program, a 'gospel show' instead. They fought over the remote control and eventually, his 68-year-old wife, his 36-year-old son Colin and his 23-year-old daughter Lebogang, killed him. They banged his head against the wall.

It is ironic isn't. Religion, in this case Christianity, has a commandment that says thou shalt not kill. Yet, passion for it has made many people kill.

It NASA sent one of its probes, Cassini to observe Saturn's biggest moon, Titan. According to two of its reports, there are indications that life exists in Titan. Organic chemicals had been detected and its surface is covered with liquid. But the liquid is not water. It is methane. Scientists presume that if there is life there, it will be likely based from methane, not water like ours here on Earth.

Cassini, the probe, sent Earth two reports:

The first report shows that hydrogen gas in the moon's atmosphere disappears at the surface. This suggests to scientists that there could be life on the surface of the moon, albeit in forms of bugs or bacteria, breathing the hydrogen like we breathe oxygen here on Earth.

The second report also indicate that a certain chemical is lacking on the surface of Titan a chemical that could serve to be consumed as food by whatever could be there.

Apparently, each one of the evidence presented may not mean much on their own but when they exist together, it is a strong indication for life to exist.

]]>marquez@reasonism.org (Marquez)Scientific AdvancesFri, 11 Jun 2010 10:00:00 +1000Jupiter loses one of its ringshttp://reasonism.org/main-content/scientific-advances/item/2301-jupiter-loses-one-of-its-rings
http://reasonism.org/main-content/scientific-advances/item/2301-jupiter-loses-one-of-its-ringsJupiter is a planet believed to be composed mostly of gas. It is characterised by bands of different layered and coloured gasses. Last year, after Jupiter hid behind the sun, away from our vision for three months, it emerged with one of its major bands missing. As surprising as this is, the planet actually losses or gains a band every fifteen years on average. We (our scientists) still do not know why.]]>marquez@reasonism.org (Marquez)Scientific AdvancesThu, 10 Jun 2010 10:00:00 +1000Queensland Schools can now teach Creationismhttp://reasonism.org/main-content/item/2300-queensland-schools-can-now-teach-creationism
http://reasonism.org/main-content/item/2300-queensland-schools-can-now-teach-creationism

For many of those who still deny the ever-strengthening influence of religion in Australia, arguing that maybe if we ignore religion, it will go away, perhaps they would be alarmed to know that Queensland State Schools will soon be teaching Creationism / Intelligent Design in their classrooms.

How can Australia begin to influence the world when it is allowing its children to be brain-washed with such baseless, simplistic answers to humanity's biggest questions? We are living in 2010 and all the evidences we have discovered that can explain much about our existence, amounts to nothing if the knowledge of those who have gone before us are not passed on to the next generation.

Further, in a multi-cultural society, why should tax payers money be used to favour one branch of religion by teaching only a Judeo-Christian explanation of who we are and why we are here? There are Buddhists, Muslim, Aboriginal versions too? What benefit is this for them? Our public education system needs to remain secular. Tax payer's money are supposed to benefit everybody... not just the Christians.